Indonesia Earthquake: School Safety Questioned as Army Joins Rescue Effort | earthquakes

Safety standards for school buildings should be prioritized in Indonesia after Monday’s earthquake, experts said, as more rescuers and volunteers were deployed on Wednesday to search for the dead and missing from the quake that killed at least 268 people.

Many of those killed in Monday’s quake in West Java were children attending Islamic schools and boarding schools in the region, said Mohajer Effendi, the coordinating minister for human development and culture. Another 1,000 people were injured.

With many missing, some remote areas still inaccessible, and more than 1,000 people injured in the 5.6-magnitude quake, the death toll is likely to rise. Hospitals near the epicenter on the densely populated island are already overwhelmed, while patients hooked up with intravenous drips lie on stretchers and cots in tents set up outside, awaiting further treatment.

Suharyanto, the head of the National Disaster Mitigation Agency, said more than 12,000 military personnel were deployed on Wednesday to bolster search efforts by more than 2,000 police, rescue workers and volunteers.

Suharyanto, who like many Indonesians uses one name, said aid is reaching thousands of people left homeless who have fled to temporary shelters where supplies can only be distributed on foot over bad terrain.

The disaster highlighted the failure to adequately ensure the safety of school buildings in the event of a disaster, according to Widjogo Prakoso, a professor of engineering at the University of Indonesia.

“School buildings should receive special attention because not only are they supposed to withstand earthquakes, but they should also serve as temporary shelters during disasters,” he said.

Indonesia: Rescue efforts underway after deadly earthquake in Java – VIDEO

As many as 142 school buildings were damaged, according to government data. More than 22,000 homes were also damaged, displacing nearly 60,000 people. Monday’s earthquake was particularly devastating because it hit the ground at a relatively shallow depth.

The national disaster agency BNPB has set guidelines for earthquake-resistant housing, but contractors often ignore them, according to Pracoso. “Contractors prefer economic profit over safety,” he said. “They want to build faster and cheaper.”

According to the Building Services Act, in the event of failures, contractors’ permits can be revoked.

In 2019, the Ministry of Education and Culture issued regulations to standardize school structures, but there is no regulation stating that they must be strong enough to serve as shelters in the event of a disaster.

Estimates of the number of school buildings exposed to earthquakes vary. According to the Ministry of Education, approximately 53,000 schools are located in earthquake-prone areas. In 2019, the BNPB recorded that 75% of more than 200,000 school buildings across Indonesia were earthquake-prone, with about 60 million students at risk.

Manlian Ronald Simanjuntak, a professor of civil engineering at Pelita Harapan University, Banten, said the local government should study data on previous earthquakes over the past 10 years. “If we know the characteristics of an earthquake, we can respond to that by building strong and flexible structures that can absorb the ground’s vibrations,” he said.

He added that the local government should develop policies based on past data to regulate school buildings.

Abdul Mahari, BNPB’s chief of communications, would not comment on why so many school buildings were destroyed during Monday’s earthquake, but said the agency would focus on rebuilding structurally better facilities.

“We have coordinated with the ministry,” Mahari told the Guardian. “We have also issued guidance on how to prepare for disasters for students.”

He referred to guidance published in May 2019 that is designed to improve disaster preparedness in schools. The Department of Education set up a task force that found that about 27,000 schools had implemented the guidelines as of 2019.

According to the ministry, from 2009 to 2018, as many as 62,687 schools – and 12 million students – were affected by natural disasters.

Indonesia has a longstanding problem with poor building standards in earthquake-prone areas.

When a 7.5-magnitude earthquake and tsunami hit Palu, Central Sulawesi, in 2018, nearly 3,000 school buildings were damaged. In January 2022, as many as 51 schools were damaged when a 6.6-magnitude earthquake struck Pandeglang, Banten, destroying more than 3,000 homes, although no injuries were reported.

In West Java, there are six active faults that can lead to earthquakes. Activity in the Semandiri fault was the cause of the 5.6-magnitude earthquake in Cianjur on Monday, according to the government geophysical agency.

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