Killer Wave: Tsunami Warning System 'Broken'
4:04pm Thursday October 28, 2010
Adam Arnold
A system set up to warn Indonesians about tsunamis was not working properly when a deadly wave struck the country earlier this week, according to an official.
The revelation comes as the number of dead from Monday's tragedy has risen to at least 343, with around 379 others still missing and 20,000 displaced. But incredibly, an 18-month-old toddler has been found alive, trapped in a clump of trees days after the three-metre high wall of water, trigged by a massive earthquake, struck the remote Mentawi islands off western Sumatra.
Rescue officials, who had not been able to get to the area for days due to stormy seas and bad weather, have now started arriving at the scene to assess the devastation. The tsunami washed away hundreds of wooden and bamboo homes in 20 villages. Many areas were underwater and houses lay crumpled, with tyres and slabs of concrete piled up on the sand. The fault line on Sumatra island's coast is the same one that caused the devastating quake and tsunami which killed 230,000 people in a dozen countries around the Indian Ocean in 2004.
Villages were wiped out in the Indonesian tsunami
After that killer wave, many countries set up early warning systems in their waters in an attempt to give people time to flee to higher ground before a tsunami crashed ashore. Indonesia's version has since fallen into such disrepair that it effectively stopped working about a month ago, according to the head of the Meteorology and Geophysic Agency.
The system, which uses buoys to electronically detect sudden changes in water level, worked when it was completed in 2008 - but by 2009 were showing problems, said agency chief Fauzi. By last month, he claimed, the entire system was broken because of inexperienced operators. "We do not have the expertise to monitor the buoys to function as intended," he said. As a result, he said, not a single siren sounded after Monday's quake.
Ash covers a villager's motorbike after Mount Merapi erupted
It was unclear if any sirens could have made a difference, since the islands worst affected were so close to the epicentre that the tsunami would have reached them within minutes. Survivors said they had almost no warning that the three-metre wall of water was bearing down on them, despite the laying of the sophisticated network of alarm buoys. Meanwhile, about 800 miles to the east in central Java, the Mount Merapi volcano was mostly quiet but still a threat after Tuesday's eruption. At least 33 people were killed and 17 others injured in that tragedy.
