Flood sweeps across Jakarta

Flood sweeps across Jakarta

JAKARTA (JP): Thousands of people fled their homes, some to hotels or relatives, others to their rooftops, yesterday as floods struck many parts of Jakarta following heavy rains the previous night.

Reports that three people were killed could not be immediately confirmed. One of the reports said that a boy was drowned and his body found in a stream in Pondok Indah, South Jakarta.

Almost no part of the city inhabited by nearly 10 million people was spared, with at least five rivers -- the Ciliwung in the east, Malang in the southeast, Pesanggrahan in the southwest, Sunter in the north and Krukut in the center -- overflowing.

Many of the city's thoroughfares were transformed into streams.

Jl. MH. Thamrin became a one-way street as one side of it was covered with water. In front of Sarinah department store building, the water reached one meter high. Jl. Gajah Mada and Hayam Wuruk were also filled with water. Monas Square was covered by 60 centimeter high flood water, with City Hall affected as well. The water flooding the Kota railway station was one meter deep, and Jl. Yos Sudarso and Jl. Perintis Kemerdekaan in the north were impassable with water reaching shoulder level.

The Islamic Hospital in Cempaka Putih and the Mintohardjo Navy Hospital in Bendungan Hilir were also affected.

With most schools in the city closed for last part of the Ramadhan fasting month and government offices and most private companies closing on Saturdays, Jakarta was spared from the even greater havoc usually associated with floods.

Still, there was major congestion throughout the city, made worse by cars breaking down on flooded streets and the fact that many traffic lights were out of order.

Public transit vehicles, including taxis, were hard to find. The state-owned PPD bus company, said it only operated 500 of its 800-strong fleet of buses because many drivers failed to turn up.

Train crash

Many train services were canceled because tracks were inundated. In the morning, a passenger train crashed into a cement truck near the Tanah Abang station. Fortunately, no one was hurt.

The few people who managed to get to work yesterday said they spent between two to three hours more than usual in getting to their destinations.

Radio stations were broadcasting reports about the flooding and about traffic jams from early in the morning. Most of them urged people to stay at home unless they really had to go out.

Thousands of people arriving at the Soekarno-Hatta International Airport were stranded as there were only a handful of buses and taxis to take them to the city.

Departing passengers also had difficulties getting to the airport.

Garuda Indonesia said 45 of its domestic and regional flights were delayed because passengers and crew turned up late, but all of its international services left on time.

"We apologize for the inconvenience," Garuda spokesman Jansius Siahaan said.

Merpati Nusantara Airlines canceled two flights, one for Semarang and another for Yogyakarta, due to a lack of passengers.

Sempati Air also reported delays and disruptions in some of its services because the computer at its City Check-In Terminal in Senayan was switched off due to the flooding.

Among the casualties of the flood was the Davis Cup match between Indonesia and South Korea at the Senayan clay court, and the roll call at the Jakarta Military Command, which was meant to launch the security operation for the Idul Fitri holiday.

TVRI also went off the air in the morning because the basement of its main office in Senayan was flooded. The state television station managed to broadcast on time for the evening program but its sister station Programa 2 was taken off the air, head of the TVRI Central Station Sudiyanto said.

"We apologize to our viewers," he said.

Thousands of telephone lines were also out of service. A spokesman for the Jakarta office of PT Telkom said the telephone numbers temporarily out of order were those beginning with 515, 520, 521, 527, 526, 525, 570, 571, 575, 251, 250, 345, and 384.

PT Satelindo which operates cellular telephone services also reported disruptions for connections to cable telephones but its director Saleh Gunawan said the company was restoring the lines.

Even many areas thought to be safe from floods all this time were inundated. One of them was the housing complex for the staff of the Indonesian Institute of Science off Jl. Gatot Subroto.

"This has never happened to us before," Mochtar Buchori, a retired researcher with the institute, said of the knee-deep water in his house.

"It happened so fast," said John Wallace, an Australian visitor to Indonesia who is staying in the Bendungan Hilir area.

The City Public Order Office said the floods affected 99 subdistricts in all five mayoralties. In Central Jakarta, among the worst affected areas were Petamburan and Sumur Batu subdistricts. In West Jakarta, the mayoralty office was inundated by two meters of water and Tanjung Duren Utara and Jelambar Baru were the worst subdistricts affected. In South Jakarta, the Petogogan subdistrict was covered by two meters of water. In the North, virtually the entire Sunter district was affected. In the east, the elite Pulo Mas housing area was inundated.

Blackouts

People whose homes were flooded said their isolation was made complete by blackouts and telephone service outage.

The City Public Order Agency sent out dozens of rubber dinghies to the worst affected areas to help with the evacuation of area residents but they were barely sufficient. Soldiers were also sent out to help and the Jakarta police were also out in full force to try to restore some order.

The Meteorology and Geophysics Agency, which warned of heavy rains for Jakarta a few weeks ago, said rainfall reached 216 millimeters (9.3 inches) in Central Jakarta between Friday and Saturday, 231 mm in North Jakarta and 99 mm in South Jakarta. These figures are exceptionally high for February.

This is the second major flood disaster to hit Jakarta in just over a month. On Jan. 7, 10 people were killed and thousands of people were left homeless when the Ciliwung River overflowed.

Last month's flood, described as the worst to hit the capital city in nearly 20 years, came with little warning because heavy rain was not coming down in Jakarta, but rather in Bogor, in the upstream area of the Ciliwung river.

As people were trying to cope with the new round of flooding yesterday afternoon, the authorities were warning that the floods could get worse, based on the readings of water levels in the upstream regions of rivers in Depok and Bogor.

The chief of the Public Security Bureau Office R. Sitindjak said the high tide in the Jakarta Bay meant that the flooding would recede slowly. (team)

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