The fatal earthquake and floods of Indonesia have taken the death toll to 96 as 70,000 citizens were left displaced as the destructive waters took away the roofs from their heads, according to the National Disaster Management Agency’s statement of Monday.
Reports state that 81 deaths were caused due to the 6.2 magnitude and 5.9 magnitude earthquakes of January 14th and 15th respectively that shook the nation, originally struck in the West Sulawesi province, Raditya Jati, the department’s spokesman said.
Xinhua news agency reported that the other 15 people lost their lives amid the floods of South Kalimantan since they took over the area on January 14th.
Following the danger of the gushing waters in the vicinity of their houses, 40,000 have been evacuated to receive shelter after the floods wreaked havoc in South Kalimantan province while due to the quakes, around 28,000 people were forced to shift to 25 evacuation centers set up in Mamuju city and Majene district of West Sulawesi province, the spokesman added.
The calamities have caused tremendous damage to the city’s architecture too as 1,150 houses collapsed along with 5 school buildings.
Evaluation of the future possible outcomes and further destructions induced by the earthquake in the city and district is under process as all risks need to be ascertained with the appropriate rescue plans.
The pandemic is making the situation worse as the spread of the virus has increased in evacuation centers where social distancing is hard to maintain at such difficult times. As such, the agency’s chief Doni Monardo said that the evacuees will undergo rapid antigen tests. Displaced people will be shifted to separate centers due to the fears of the contagious virus.
“There will be antigen tests to ensure that the evacuees have not been infected by the Covid-19 virus,” Monardo said.
Floods in the South Kalimantan province have washed away almost 25,000 houses while hundreds of trees have been uprooted by the beastly waters.
The government has declared a state of emergency in the area on January 14th. It continues to be in place as the risk assessment is still going on and is expected to stay as nature seems in no mood to calm its anger.
Recently, Indonesians suffered another tragedy as an air flight was crashed 4 minutes after taking off. The unfortunate incident took the lives of all 62 on board as the plane fell into the Java sea.
