Floods Displace 4,000 in West Java, Indonesia

BNPD, the disaster management agency in Indonesia, said yesterday that an embankment on the Cimanuk river had been breached, forcing around 4,000 people from their homes. The embankment failure occurred in the village of Pilangsari village, Indramayu, West Java province. Around 1,000 houses and 100 hectares of rice fields were under flood water that, at one point, was up to 3 metres deep in places. BNPD say that at least 15,000 people have been affected overall across several districts of Indramayu. The embamkment was built in 2012, according to local media. BNPD say that levels of the Cimanuk had increased after heavy rain in catchment areas of Garut and Majalengka. River levels increased to a point where, according to local media, a 150 metre stretch of the embankment was damaged and the river overflowed. Indramayu lies about 200 km east of Jakarta. The flooding has blocked one of the area’s major coastal roads at Jatibarang, disrupting traffic heading to and from the capital. Local authorities, military and police personnel and volunteers carried out evacuations and are working to distribute food and blankets to those displaced. In their most recent report of March 17, 2015 7:28 pm (local time), BNPD say that the floods have started to recede. Heavy rain has been falling in the region generally over the last few days. WMO say that Ketapang, West Kalimantan saw 281.2 mm of rain in 24 hours between 16 and 17 March 2015. In Sintang, Kalimantan, 81 mm of rain fell in the same period. In East Java, Surabaya saw 51.1 mm of rain in 24 hours to 16 March, 2015