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“Nine basic commodities, side dishes, milk, slippers needed by refugees recently relocated to Tegalsari
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“Nine basic commodities, side dishes, milk, slippers needed by refugees recently relocated to Tegalsari. Need complete supplies. Contact Bayu at 0815xxxxxx.”
That’s one of the Twitter feeds at @jalinmerapi, a network of volunteers in the relief efforts in Yogyakarta, where Mt. Merapi has been spewing heat clouds and ash over the past three weeks.
Before long, the Twitter feed was picked up by others and soon re-tweeted by other Twitter users.
Since the first eruption of Mt. Merapi on Oct. 26, the account never stops giving updates on evacuation points in need of relief supplies and the contact numbers of relief workers manning the locations.
One of administrators of @jalinmerapi, Budi Hermanto, said the Twitter account was set up by 40 volunteers and relief workers two days before the first eruption. These volunteers thought that a rapid response to the Merapi crisis could save lives in the event of a major eruption.
“The volunteers, including myself, started a discussion on what needed to be done should Merapi erupt. We came up with the idea of using Twitter and Facebook to disseminate information on the actual condition from ground zero,” Budi told The Jakarta Post.
The group then set up Twitter account @jalinmerapi, short for Jaringan Informasi Lingkar Merapi (Merapi Circle of Information Network). Members of the group also set up the Jalin Merapi account on Facebook.
It is easy to see why the volunteers chose the social media. “Many movements take place in the social media, so why not make the most of it?” he said.
Early on, the @jalinmerapi account had only 40 followers, mostly volunteers who initiated the account. It was these volunteers who gave the Twitter feeds on actual conditions from the disaster zone.
“But soon after the eruption, the number of followers increased exponentially to 1,000. Now we have almost 34,000 followers, both volunteers and donors,” Budi said.
@jalinmerapi was first established in 2006, when Mt. Merapi erupted. At the time, however, Twitter was not that effective as social media was yet to catch on and radio communication was far more
common.
Today, the social media has made it easier for them to distribute relief supplies to distant places like Boyolali and Klaten.
“Not only do we get good relief supplies, we have people providing a free server for us at merapi.combine.co.id as well as lending a hand when we have problems with hackers.”
Another twitter account that has played an important role in disaster relief is @infobencana, run by the Air Putih Foundation.
The account was set up two years ago but has not been promoted much and is therefore less visible than @jalinmerapi, said founder Imron Fauzi of Air Putih’s emergency response unit.
So far the account has 1,500 followers, and has wider area of coverage, including tsunami-hit Mentawai Islands in West Sumatra and flashflood-struck Wasior in Papua.
Imron, however, acknowledged that @infobencana got more updates on Merapi and fewer on Mentawai and Wasior, given the problems with internet connections in the regions.
