The National Disaster Mitigation Agency has recorded at least eight deaths, 40 injuries and more than 1,100 damaged houses from the 6.0 magnitude quake.

The deadly temblor struck as East Nusa Tenggara and West Nusa Tenggara were recovering from the fatal impacts of tropical cyclone Seroja, which killed more than 200 in the provinces and the neighboring country of Timor Leste on April 4. President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo visited the victims of the cyclone on Friday and pledged to relocate them to new settlements.

Natural disasters, especially earthquakes, are common in Indonesia because the country is hemmed in by the Eurasian, Pacific and Australian tectonic plates, resulting significant seismic activity. Major quakes have rocked the archipelago many times, as well as volcanic eruptions and floods.

A quake of the scale seen in the 2004 Aceh disaster is perhaps a one-off event, but numerous earthquakes with significant impacts have occurred, such as the 2006 quake in Yogyakarta and parts of Central Java. In 2018, three major earthquakes killed nearly 3,000 in the span of five months: the Lombok quake in early August, the Central Sulawesi quake and tsunami in late September and the Sunda Strait quake near the end of the year.

Many in Malang and its surrounding areas were caught by surprise by the weekend quake, but scientists were aware that the East Java town lay on an active tectonic plate. Earthquakes shook East Java several times in the 20th century, namely in 1972, 1963, 1962 and 1937.

Indonesia also began the year with a quake that shook Majene, Southeast Sulawesi, on Jan. 15, killing at least 84 people and displacing 40,000 others. Reconstruction work is still underway there, involving the local government and volunteers.

The Meteorology, Geophysics and Climatology Agency has said the country will continue to have to live with earthquakes. Six plate subduction zones exist in the archipelago, including 13 megathrust segments that can trigger huge quakes and tsunamis. Western Sumatra, southern Java, northern Sulawesi, the Maluku Sea and northern Papua are each the location of a megathrust segment.

Scientists have also detected 295 active tectonic plates in Indonesia, which is why the country is very prone to earthquakes.

Unfortunately, no technology or person can predict an earthquake. The only thing we can do is to mitigate the impact by educating the public about what to do when an earthquake occurs.

While forecasting earthquakes is next to impossible and attempts to do so may only result in misinformation, disaster preparedness is key to saving lives.

Improving public knowledge about disasters, providing training and drills for students and communities, particularly those in vulnerable regions, mapping out evacuation routes and campaigning for quake-resistant buildings are important mitigation efforts.

It may not be that we live in fear because natural disasters can occur at any time, but because we know only little about them.

Popular

Great Barrier Reef hit by record bleaching

Govt to undo latest curbs on personal imports

Middle East on edge as Israel and Iran trade threats