As of Friday morning, Indonesian flight authorities have issued clearance for 23 aircraft from 12 countries to help survivors a 7.4-magnitude earthquake in Palu, Sigi and Donggala, according to Foreign Ministry spokesperson Arrmanatha Nasir.

“However, only some of them have reached Balikpapan, because of the busy air traffic. The remaining ones are still in Jakarta,” Arrmanatha said in Jakarta on Friday.

On Wednesday, aid from Singapore, Malaysia and India had arrived in Balikpapan, while Friday saw planes land with supplies from Australia, New Zealand, Japan and the United Kingdom. Some of the aid from Singapore, Malaysia and India had reached Palu by Friday afternoon, while aid from South Korea also arrived in the disaster-hit city.

Japanese Ambassador to Indonesia Masafumi Ishii said Tokyo had dispatched a Hercules C-130 aircraft and around 51 personnel of the Japan Disaster Relief Self-Defense Force Unit to Balikpapan. They were assigned to conduct air transportation between Balikpapan and Palu starting on Saturday.

Apart from that, the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) has sent 500 tents, 20 water purifiers, 20,000 flocculants and 80 generators. Meanwhile, 20 companies associated with the Jakarta Japan Club had donated more than Rp 5 billion by Thursday, Masafumi said.

“We are also thinking of reconstruction of Palu and the surrounding areas after the disasters. Thus, the JICA has offered its expertise to help reconstructing Palu and Donggala in the future,” Masafumi said at the Foreign Ministry on Friday after a meeting with Deputy Foreign Minister A.M. Fachir.

The JICA would present the reconstruction aid plan to President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo at the upcoming International Monetary Fund–World Bank meeting, Masafumi said.

However, he emphasized, the Indonesian government had not yet responded to the offer, as it was currently focusing on relief efforts.

Asked whether the JICA would also help reconstruct Lombok in West Nusa Tenggara, which was struck by devastating earthquakes a few months earlier, Masafumi said it was possible, but the agency was currently offering help for Palu and Donggala.

The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) has distributed aid in the form of hygiene kits, blankets, solar lights, other disaster recovery supplies and special tents to shelter children impacted by the disasters.

The US has also dispatched three Hercules C-130 aircraft scheduled to land in Balikpapan on Friday to help carry aid to Palu starting on Saturday morning.

On Friday afternoon, aid worth some Rp 60 billion arrived in Balikpapan from the UK. UK Ambassador to Indonesia Moazzam Malik accompanied the aid in person.

Malik said the UK had sent bottled drinking water, tents, tarpaulin, hygiene kits, solar lighting and ground handling equipment to facilitate with the unloading process at the airport.

An Airbus A400M landed at Balikpapan’s Sepinggan Airport at 2:20 p.m. local time.

“The relief aid will be enough for roughly 10,000 people,” Malik said.

In a video message recorded at the UK Embassy in Jakarta on Thursday, Malik said a Royal Airforce plane carrying aid from a warehouse of the UK Department for International Development (DFID) in the Middle East had departed in the morning.

“A second aid flight is being loaded in the UK right now. A third flight is planned,” he said in the video. (evi)