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Governor Anies wants flash floods in Jakarta to subside within six hours
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Floods hit the densely populated area of Bendungan Hilir, Central Jakarta on Feb. 25. Heavy rain and poor drainage systems have caused several locations in the capital to be flooded. (JP/Dhoni Setiawan )
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s the rainy season has hit Indonesia, and with it the possibility of daily rainfall above 100 millimeters, the Jakarta administration is scrambling to ensure that flooding in the capital city subsides within six hours and does not cause any casualties.
“We are now taking measures to prepare for such an occurrence,” Jakarta Governor Anies Baswedan said on Thursday as quoted by tempo.co.
Anies said floods would still inundate Jakarta if the rainfall intensity exceeded 100 mm, which is the maximum capacity for the capital’s drainage system.
The governor, however, told his administration that floods should not occur if the rain intensity was below the drainage system's maximum capacity.
Read also: Dozens of Jakarta neighborhoods flooded after Sunday night rain
The last time Jakarta saw daily rainfall intensity above 100 mm was back in January when 377 mm of heavy rainfall hit the capital city on New Year's day.
The heavy rain in January, which the Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics Agency (BMKG) called the worst rainfall in Jakarta since 2007, caused severe flooding in the capital and its satellite cities on the first day of 2020.
The BMKG predicted that Indonesia would enter the rainy season by the end of October, with the peak in January and February next year for most regions of the country. The agency also warned residents of Jakarta and West Java of floods as the areas reported torrential rain during the transition from the dry season.
The La Niña weather phenomenon could increase accumulated precipitation in Indonesia by up to 40 percent, said the BMKG in October, with heavy rainfall expected in several regions across the archipelago until February 2021. (mfp)
