Floods in Southeast Aceh Affect Thousands of Residents in 59 Villages

Southeast Aceh BPBD officers and students cleaned a muddy classroom due to flooding in Southeast Aceh. (ANTARA/HO-BPBD Southeast Aceh)

BANDA ACEH - The Aceh Disaster Management Agency (BPBA) said the floods triggered by high rainfall in Southeast Aceh Regency affected 8,101 people or 2,230 households (KK) spread across 59 villages in the district.

BPBA Chief Executive Ilyas said the latest information obtained from the Southeast Aceh BPBD was that several locations were still inundated, and the affected areas were as many as 10 sub-districts covering 59 villages.

"The current condition is that some locations are still inundated," said Ilyas through the BPBA Disaster Management Operations Control Center (Pusdalops) quoted by ANTARA, Tuesday, August 22.

He explained that the flood overflowing the watershed, which was triggered by high intensity rains in Southeast Aceh, had occurred since Thursday (17/8) evening. Until now, the Southeast Aceh Regional Disaster Management Agency (BPBD) continues to make efforts to deal with and collect data on victims or affected residents.

"There were 326 refugees and there were no casualties in this incident," he said.

According to Ilyas, the Southeast Aceh BPBD has installed tents and public hydrants for clean water in several flood locations. The Southeast Aceh Regency Government has also handed over emergency aid in the form of rice, sugar, blankets, sarongs, instant noodles, fast food and bread.

Apart from that, his party has also deployed three excavator units to the location for flood disaster management, as well as cleaning up public facilities including the muddy Terutung Payung Village MIN.

The flood-affected areas include 23 gampongs (village) in Bambel District, 6 gampongs in Lawe Sumur, Semadam

as many as five gampongs, as well as Bukit Tusam District as many as eight gampongs.

Furthermore, Lawe Bulan sub-district has five gampongs, Babussalam three gampongs, Tanoh Alas two gampongs, Lawe Sigala-Gala

four gampongs, two gampongs in Lawe Alas, and one gampong in Babul Rahmah District.

Apart from submerging residents' houses, he said, this incident also caused the Gampong Kuta Buluh bridge to be blocked, the Lawe Kinga River embankment and the Lawe Alas River to collapse.

In addition, several elementary schools and mosques were submerged in water and muddy, and bridges were clogged and broken. The floods also damaged about 746 hectares of paddy fields and about 119 hectares of corn fields.