As thousands continue to seek shelter in East Nusa Tenggara (NTT), President Prabowo Subianto is under pressure to roll out robust recovery efforts as the region is standing on shaky ground from the initial earthquake.
Five days after the 7.7-magnitude quake jolted most parts of Flores Island, some residents in the West Cibal subdistrict, Manggarai regency, NTT, were forced to build makeshift tents from scratch while still needing other provisions to survive.
“Now we need tarpaulin covers, food and medicines (because) the tents we built by ourselves are so fragile,” West Cibal resident Yohanes Lesing said on Wednesday.
In the Kota Komba district in East Manggarai, residents also called for clean water access that has been disrupted after the earthquake.
The Aug 15 earthquake’s epicentre was located off the coast of Flores Island, triggering brief tsunami alerts and damages in at least nine regencies across the province. The National Disaster Mitigation Agency (BNPB) confirmed at least 71 casualties, as of Wednesday afternoon.
The disaster agency said nearly 60,000 people were taking shelter across NTT after the earthquake as of Wednesday afternoon.
In a statement, Cabinet Secretary Teddy Indra Wijaya said the government, as per Prabowo’s order, had distributed a total of 253 tonnes of logistics to the impacted regions since the quake struck.
Five aircraft were dispatched from Halim Perdanakusuma Air Force Base in Jakarta on Wednesday carrying 65 tonnes of food, drinking water, tents and medical supplies for survivors. Authorities also set up two new emergency centres in Labuan Bajo and Maumere.
“According to the Public Works Minister, all land routes (to impacted regions) were restored since the second day,” he said.
But authorities are urged to work quickly to help the survivors, as Flores is facing potential threats from further tremors that have been jolting the island since the initial earthquake.
The Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics Agency (BMKG) recorded that at least 3,002 aftershocks had struck NTT since the Aug 15 earthquake. The size of the follow-up tremors varied, ranging from 1.1 to 6.2 in magnitude, with at least 25 recorded above magnitude 5.
NTT is considered very at risk for earthquakes because of its location, which is squeezed by several tectonic areas, including a deep subduction zone to the south where the Indo-Australian plate pushes under the Eurasian plate.
In their joint analysis issued on Tuesday, seismologists Kadek Hendrawan Palgunadi of Surabaya Institute of Technology (ITS) and Andrean Simanjuntak of BMKG warned the aftershocks during the first two weeks after the initial quake would be the most critical and fragile phase for NTT.
“It is not that the aftershocks will grow stronger, but because many buildings are already damaged and have lost their structural strength,” the researchers wrote. “Even an aftershock with a (smaller) magnitude of 5 could destroy critical structures.” — The Jakarta Post/ANN
