Incessant heavy rain since Tuesday evening triggered floods that inundated four housing complexes in Tangerang, Banten, on Wednesday.

The floodwaters, reaching a depth of up to 2.5 meters, affected the housing complexes of Total Persada, Puri Cipondoh Asri, the Home Affairs Ministry'€™s (DDN) employees and Ciledug Indah, said Iksan Bakti, coordinator of the local youth disaster alert unit.

Authorities have deployed personnel to help evacuate the flood victims, Antara news agency reported.

A number of roads such as Jl. Ciledug and Jl. Parung Serab were also inundated.

Meanwhile, the National Disaster Mitigation Agency (BNPB) has reported that some 137 people have died and 1.1 million have been evacuated due to floods and landslides nationwide since the beginning of this month.

BNPB spokesman Sutopo Purwo Nugroho said in a press release on Tuesday that floods and landslides may continue to occur until March, due to normal rain patterns, with a peak expected between January and March -- except in Maluku and Halmahere, where the peak rainfall occurs between June and July.

Sutopo added that, based on the BNPB's preliminary data, a total of 182 hydro-meteorological disasters such as floods, landslides and tornadoes occurred this month.

Besides the loss of life and displacement of people, 1,234 houses have been heavily damaged, 273 moderately damaged and 2,586 lightly damaged.

Infrastructure, agricultural lands and other properties have also sustained damage from the extreme weather.

'€œMost of the deaths were caused by landslides, such as in Kudus, Manado, Tomohon and Jombang,'€ Sutopo pointed out.

Regarding the economic impact of the disasters, he explained that the losses due to flash floods in North Sulawesi had reached around Rp 1.87 trillion, while the damage from floods in Jakarta could reach Rp 1 trillion.

He estimated that the total losses from the disasters could reach Rp 30 trillion nationwide.

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