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View all search resultsDisasters loom amid COVID-19 pandemic
Meteorologists warn of extreme weather and more natural disasters as response efforts are strained by the pandemic and an investigation into the Sriwijaya plane crash.
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fter months of battling the coronavirus pandemic that has yet to show any signs of subsiding, the nation’s disaster mitigation agency is now expected to gear up for a string of natural disasters that may occur as the country enters the peak of the rainy season.
In the first two weeks of 2021, the country has already been dealing with the devastating aftermath of an airplane crash, a landslide and an earthquake.
On the very same day that news broke about the sudden disappearance of Sriwijaya Air flight SJ182 off the coast of Jakarta on Saturday, a series of landslides in Sumedang, West Java wreaked havoc and devastated dozens of families, with at least 16 dead and 23 more still missing.
Even before the airplane took off and plunged into the sea with 62 people on board mere minutes later, the flight was delayed for about an hour due to heavy rain. The real cause of the crash is still under investigation.
The cause of the Sumedang landslides, however, was more straightforward.
Following heavy rainfall that began in the afternoon, the first landslide occurred at around 4 p.m. when a 20-meter cliff in Cihanjuang village in Sumedang regency’s Cimanggung district collapsed and buried 14 houses beneath it. When a search-and-rescue team was evacuating victims from the houses, another landslide occurred at 6:30 p.m. at the same location, killing several members of the team.
