BMKG to Trial Earthquake Early Warning System This Month in DKI, West Java, and Lampung

The Indonesian Agency for Meteorology, Climatology, and Geophysics (BMKG) will trial the operation of the Earthquake Early Warning System (EEWS) equipment. BMKG stated that trials have been conducted over the past two years. “Then, I also need to introduce that this month we will attempt to operationalise the Earthquake Early Warning System. This comes after we tried it over the last one or two years,” said BMKG Head Teuku Faisal Fathani at Graha BNPB, East Jakarta, on Thursday (2/4/2026). Faisal stated that the equipment will be trialled in three provinces: DKI Jakarta, West Java, and Lampung. “We are doing this in three provinces because it requires quite a large investment,” he added. Faisal explained that the installed equipment consists of sensors that monitor the arrival of waves. The monitored waves are primary waves and secondary waves. “The sensors we install monitor the arrival of the P wave or primary wave, which is smaller, and then to predict when the S wave or secondary wave, which is larger, will arrive,” he said. Faisal explained that with this equipment, earthquakes can be detected tens of seconds before they occur. The earthquake will be detected through the primary wave. “This can provide, depending on our distance from the earthquake’s centre, from tens of seconds up to 20 seconds before the actual earthquake occurs by monitoring the arrival of the P wave,” he said.