Lapang Islanders in Indonesia

"A Summary" – Apr 2, 2011 (Kryon channelled by Lee Carroll) (Subjects: Religion, Shift of Human Consciousness, 2012, Intelligent/Benevolent Design, EU, South America, 5 Currencies, Water Cycle (Heat up, Mini Ice Ace, Oceans, Fish, Earthquakes ..), Middle East, Internet, Israel, Dictators, Palestine, US, Japan (Quake/Tsunami Disasters , People, Society ...), Nuclear Power Revealed, Hydro Power, Geothermal Power, Moon, Financial Institutes (Recession, Realign integrity values ..) , China, North Korea, Global Unity,..... etc.) -

“ … Here is another one. A change in what Human nature will allow for government. "Careful, Kryon, don't talk about politics. You'll get in trouble." I won't get in trouble. I'm going to tell you to watch for leadership that cares about you. "You mean politics is going to change?" It already has. It's beginning. Watch for it. You're going to see a total phase-out of old energy dictatorships eventually. The potential is that you're going to see that before 2013.

They're going to fall over, you know, because the energy of the population will not sustain an old energy leader ..."

(Live Kryon Channelings was given 7 times within the United Nations building.)


Question: Dear Kryon: I live in Spain. I am sorry if I will ask you a question you might have already answered, but the translations of your books are very slow and I might not have gathered all information you have already given. I am quite concerned about abandoned animals. It seems that many people buy animals for their children and as soon as they grow, they set them out somewhere. Recently I had the occasion to see a small kitten in the middle of the street. I did not immediately react, since I could have stopped and taken it, without getting out of the car. So, I went on and at the first occasion I could turn, I went back to see if I could take the kitten, but it was to late, somebody had already killed it. This happened some month ago, but I still feel very sorry for that kitten. I just would like to know, what kind of entity are these animals and how does this fit in our world. Are these entities which choose this kind of life, like we do choose our kind of Human life? I see so many abandoned animals and every time I see one, my heart aches... I would like to know more about them.

Answer: Dear one, indeed the answer has been given, but let us give it again so you all understand. Animals are here on earth for three (3) reasons.

(1) The balance of biological life. . . the circle of energy that is needed for you to exist in what you call "nature."

(2) To be harvested. Yes, it's true. Many exist for your sustenance, and this is appropriate. It is a harmony between Human and animal, and always has. Remember the buffalo that willingly came into the indigenous tribes to be sacrificed when called? These are stories that you should examine again. The inappropriateness of today's culture is how these precious creatures are treated. Did you know that if there was an honoring ceremony at their death, they would nourish you better? Did you know that there is ceremony that could benefit all of humanity in this way. Perhaps it's time you saw it.

(3) To be loved and to love. For many cultures, animals serve as surrogate children, loved and taken care of. It gives Humans a chance to show compassion when they need it, and to have unconditional love when they need it. This is extremely important to many, and provides balance and centering for many.

Do animals know all this? At a basic level, they do. Not in the way you "know," but in a cellular awareness they understand that they are here in service to planet earth. If you honor them in all three instances, then balance will be the result. Your feelings about their treatment is important. Temper your reactions with the spiritual logic of their appropriateness and their service to humanity. Honor them in all three cases.

Japan's Antarctic whaling hunt ruled 'not scientific'

Japan's Antarctic whaling hunt ruled 'not scientific'
Representatives of Japan and Australia shake hands at the court in The Hague. (NOS/ANP) - 31 March 2014
"Fast-Tracking" - Feb 8, 2014 (Kryon Channelling by Lee Carroll) - (Reference to Fukushima / H-bomb nuclear pollution and a warning about nuclear > 20 Min)

China calls for peaceful settlement of maritime disputes

China calls for peaceful settlement of maritime disputes
Wang Min, China's deputy permanent representative to the United Nations, speaks during a meeting to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the enforcement of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, at the UN headquarters in New York, on June 9, 2014. The Chinese envoy on Monday called for a harmonious maritime order, saying that maritime disputes should be settled through negotiation between the parties directly involved. (Xinhua/Niu Xiaolei)

UNCLOS 200 nautical miles vs China claimed territorial waters

UNCLOS 200 nautical miles vs China claimed territorial waters

Thursday, December 31, 2009

Rembang Beach Planted with Mangroves

Tempo Interactive, Wednesday, 30 December, 2009 | 16:49 WIB

TEMPO Interactive, Rembang: Hundreds of students from the Nature Lovers Community of the School of Economic Science at YPPI Rembang and other students from Rembang district have planted mangroves on a beach situated in Dukuh Kaliuntu, Pasar Banggi village, Rembang Kota district.

”There are 5,000 mangrove seeds to restore the beach,” said Swantika, coordinator of the activity when contacted yesterday.

They plan to plant the 5 hectare beach with 10.000 mangrove trees. But due to difficulties in obtaining seeds, Swantika said, this year they can only plant 5,000. The students have been planting mangroves now for two years.

The 60 km long Rembang beach is considered to have suffered serious damage. Many areas are transformed into shrimp, milkfish or salt embankments.

There is no regulation to protect the area until now,” said the Head of the Rembang Environment Office Purwadi.

BANDELAN A

Marine Station Launched

Tempo Interactive, Wednesday, 30 December, 2009 | 16:53 WIB

TEMPO Interactive, Semarang: Diponegoro University, Semarang, has launched a Marine Station in Awur Bay, Jepara. The Marine Station is projected as to be a maritime and coastal research and study center with international standards.

“This is an effort to develop marine science productivity,” said the Head of the Marine Station Laboratory Ir. Suryono yesterday. The Marine Station launching was held on Monday.

The station will be the center of maritime and coastal research and study. The research results can be accessed and used for studies or business development purposes.

The research service includes management of coastal and maritime resources which studies exploration potential, conservation and pollution. Besides that, the station will also study sea cultivation, biotechnology, area management and sea cultivation technological package.

“There will also be studies on non-biological potential exploitation, such as embankments, soil water and electric resources,” he said.

ROFIUDDIN

Wednesday, December 30, 2009

Navy ready to modernize warship fleet

Novan Iman Santosa, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta | Wed, 12/30/2009 8:59 AM


The Indonesian Navy is ready to modernize its fleet of warships and aircraft in 2010 as part of its effort to fulfill the minimum essential force (MEF) capability.


Navy chief of staff Vice Adm. Agus Suhartono said Tuesday the MEF concept was designed to fulfill core duties and ensure certain capabilities to face threats in defending the state ideology and territorial integrity, protecting the nation’s honor and safety, and enforcing the law in Indonesian waters when a threat may be larger than the available force.


To reach the MEF capability, Agus said the Navy had three strategies, to procure new weaponry systems by prioritizing domestic strategic industries, increasing the capabilities of existing systems and phasing out systems that are no longer effective.


“We will be procuring corvettes, landing ship tanks [LSTs], missile-equipped fast boats [KCR], trimaran KCR and training ship,” he said.


“As for airplanes, a contract has been signed to procure three CN-235 maritime patrol aircraft.”


Agus was speaking at a press conference on the Navy’s performance in 2009 and plans for the coming year.


He told The Jakarta Post the Navy would replace the KRI Dewa Ruci with a new and longer tall ship.


“The new tall ship will be 105 meters long and the procurement is currently being processed,” he said.


Made in Germany, the barquentine entered service with the Indonesian Navy in 1953.


Agus also said 35 units of Russian-made BMP-3F amphibious tanks would be deployed in 2010.


As for submarines, he said the President has decided to consider the government’s financial condition, but said it was expected that two submarines would be purchased in 2014.


Agus told the conference the Navy managed to secure some Rp 13.8 trillion in potential state losses by preventing illegal activities.


The figure is slightly higher than 2008’s figure of Rp 13.7 trillion.


He said Rp 2.4 trillion was saved from illegal fishing, Rp 52.4 billion from illegal logging and Rp 11.3 trillion from various cases including commodities such as granite, coal, tin, fuel, cement, sand and crude palm oil.


Agus said such sea security duties were part of the Navy’s military operations in addition to war responsibilities.


“The Navy is also involved in diplomatic duty to support the government’s foreign policy, including goodwill missions, sending officers for training abroad and exercises with foreign navies,” he told the conference.


“We also send our personnel and task force to UN missions in Congo, Lebanon, Nepal and Somalia.”


The SIGMA-class KRI Diponegoro has served a six-month monitoring mission under the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon’s Maritime Task Force.


“We are ready to send KRI Frans Kaisiepo to Lebanon pending orders from the Indonesian Military headquarters,” Agus told the Post.


The press conference was closed with a shooting competition for Navy officers, chief editors, producers and reporters.



Tuesday, December 29, 2009

East Flood Canal to reach sea within days

Indah Setiawati, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta | Tue, 12/29/2009 8:29 PM


Governor Fauzi Bowo on Tuesday announced the East Flood Canal (BKT) would reach the sea on Dec. 31.


“As we have promised, on Dec. 31, the BKT will connect with the sea. But we have to admit that there are certain spots that haven't reached the required width,” he said on Tuesday.


Head of the Ciliwung-Cisadane Flood Bureau at the Public Works Ministry, Pitoyo Subandrio, confirmed the information, saying the width at some parts of the canal was still 15 meters from the required 70 meters width.


He said the areas needing widening were at the Kali Sunter bridge in East Jakarta, Pahlawan Revolusi bridge, ex-the power substation, Pondok Kopi, Haji Miran, Rawa Bebek and Marunda in North Jakarta.


The unfinished areas, he said, would not hinder the flow of water to the sea as the depth of the locations had reached four to seven meters.


“We have pushed the contractors to connect the canal to the sea by the end of December to mitigate the annual flood in January,” Pitoyo said.


He said the construction of the East Flood Canal was 96.5 percent complete, with the inspection roads, bridges and wire fence as the remaining projects.


He believed the contractors would finish the rest of the project before their contract term finished in June because the city had settled the hardest part – the land procurement – on Dec. 18.



Monday, December 28, 2009

VP: North Sulawesi on fast track of development

Antara News, Monday, December 28, 2009 21:24 WIB

Manado, N Sulawesi (ANTARA News) - Vice President Boediono said North Sulawesi province was now in the fast track of development in line with its increasing annual economic growth.

"North Sulawesi has made significant achievements in development in line with its geographic excellence and natural resource potentials," the vice president said when attending a Christmas service here on Monday.

He said that North Sulawesi`s economic growth had always been above the average national economic growth rate where in 2004 this province only recorded a growth of 4.9 percent but in 2009 it had reached 8.7 percent.

"North Sulawesi should maintain its economic growth so that it would generate and maintain the pace of its development and improve the people`s welfare," Boediono said.

In the meantime, North Sulawesi Governor Sarundajang said the progress made by North Sulawesi in development was inseparable from the role of the Central Government, including its success in organizing the World Ocean Conference (WOC) and Coral Trianggle Initiative (CTI) in May 2009.

New Zealand: 125 pilot whales die on beaches

NDTV, Associated Press, Monday December 28, 2009, Coromandel peninsula, New Zealand


Some 125 pilot whales died in New Zealand after getting stranded on the beach over the weekend, but vacationers and conservation workers on Sunday managed to coax 43 others back out to sea.

Rescuers monitored the survivors as they swam away from Colville Beach on North Island's Coromandel peninsula, and by Monday morning they were reported well out to sea.

Department of Conservation workers and hundreds of volunteers helped re-float the 43 whales at high tide. The volunteers covered the stranded mammals in sheets and kept them wet through the day.

"We've been here probably about three and a half, four hours and we've been just listening to instructions and yeah, trying to keep them as wet as possible and comfortable," volunteer Deanna Pandy told New Zealand television.

Conservation officials said one of the whales may have been sick, or their sonar may have led them into the shallow harbour and they couldn't find their way out again.

On Monday, more than 20 whales were buried by local Coromandel Maori. Meanwhile on South Island, 105 long-finned pilot whales that stranded died on Saturday, conservation officials said on Monday.

Officials said they were discovered by a tourist plane pilot and only 30 were alive when conservation workers arrived. Because the site is part of a nature reserve, the 105 whale carcasses were left to decompose where they stranded, officials said.

Large numbers of whales become stranded on New Zealand's beaches each summer as they pass by on their way to breeding grounds from Antarctic waters. Scientists so far have been unable to explain why whales become stranded.

Nature Extracts Price From Those Who Live On the Ring of Fire

The Jakarta Globe, Anita Rachman, Nurfika Osman & Arientha Primanita


A mud-smeared shop displaying a closed sign in the Situ Gintung neighborhood in Tangerang, just outside Jakarta, after a dam collapsed in March, leading to the deaths of more than 100 people. (JG Photo/ Yudhi Sukma Wijaya)


Sitting astride the “Ring of Fire,” a geologically unstable section of the earth’s crust below the Pacific Ocean, Indonesia receives deadly jolts from Mother Nature in the form of earthquakes and volcanoes with numbing regularity.


Inadequate infrastructure, torrential rains and other pressures also leave us at risk of disasters, which are made worse by human folly or error. Though 2009 was not as bad as some other years, many people were still left grieving for loved ones claimed by catastrophes ranging from powerful earthquakes to sunken ferry ships and broken dams.


The tragedies to remember:


January 11: After ignoring safety warnings, the passenger ferry MV Teratai Prima sinks off the coast of West Sulawesi near Majene district. The ship, carrying at least 267 people, was hit by large waves during a storm and capsized, killing nearly 240.


Overloading, a perennial problem on poorly regulated interisland ferries, was suspected to have contributed to the accident.


The Teratai Prima was en route from Pare-Pare to Samarinda in East Kalimantan. The captain of the ferry was cited for negligence and later sentenced to nine years in jail for actions that contributed to the loss of life. The captain was reported to have refused to heed warnings from the port authority about the coming storm prior to departure.


The 700-ton Teratai Prima also had a registered capacity of only 250 passengers and the precise number of people aboard was never determined; few bodies were recovered from the sea.


The waters off Majene were also the site of the crash of Adam Air flight 574 after it lost contact with ground control on Jan. 1, 2007.


March 27: The Situ Gintung dam near Jakarta collapses in the early morning, causing a massive torrent of water and debris to run downstream, killing more than 100 people.


A heavy downpour the previous night had caused the reservoir to begin overflowing and cracks to appear in the dam. At dawn, as people living behind the dam were still sleeping, the structure gave way. About 200 families lost their homes in the flash flood.


After the disaster, it was reported that cracks had begun appearing in the structure a year earlier but residents had not been warned of the danger. “We never expected the water to come like a tsunami, as happened on Friday morning,” said Wakidi, a community leader.


The dam in South Tangerang, Banten, was built by the Dutch colonial government in the 1930s. When it was first built, the reservoir covered 31 hectares, but due to siltation this fell to about 21 hectares.


Initially Situ Gintung was built to irrigate nearby farmland but as the area became residential, the dam functioned as a water conservation tool. Houses filled an area behind the dam that was intended to be a spillway.


Pitoyo Subandrio, the head of the Ciliwung-Cisadane Agency of the Public Works Ministry, has said that rehabilitation of the dam is under way.


September 2: A strong earthquake jolts West Java — and parts of Jakarta — leaving at least 33 people dead and more than 3,500 buildings damaged. The 7.0-magnitude quake hit off the southern coast of Java near the Tasikmalaya district.


Tasikmalaya was the area hardest hit by the tremors but West Java’s coastal areas, like Indramayu, Cianjur, Ciamis, Kuningan and Pengalengan, were also affected.


By year-end, many West Java quake survivors were still living in semipermanent structures, pending the reconstruction of their homes.


September 30: A powerful 7.9-magnitude earthquake strikes near the city of Padang on the West Sumatra coast, killing more than 1,000 people. The tremor destroys not only houses and buildings in Padang, but also devastates villages and towns in nearby areas.


Officials reported 1,195 dead. The greatest number of casualties were in the Padang Pariaman district, where 666 people died. In Padang itself, 383 people died. The total cost of damage caused by the quake was estimated to be at least Rp 4.8 trillion ($509 million), but some officials put the total at twice that figure, saying many vital public buildings would have to be rebuilt.


Search and rescue teams came to the area from around the nation and several countries. Indonesians also responded with an outpouring of donations for victims, many of whom were trapped under buildings that were not built to contemporary standards for surviving earthquakes.


The story of Ratna Kurniasari Virgo, 20, a student, and Susi Revika Wulan Sari, a teacher, gripped television viewers when they were pulled from the wreckage of a school in Padang nearly two days after the quake.


Padang Deputy Mayor Mahyeldi Ansyarullah said that nearly 110,000 houses in Padang were damaged, 40,000 severely, and more than 1,000 classrooms were destroyed.


Both the local government and international aid workers noted that the emergency response to the Padang earthquake was an improvement over past disasters such as the 2004 tsunami in Aceh and the 2006 Yogyakarta earthquake. Officials said that training exercises had paid off in terms of disaster response.


November 22: The Dumai Express 10 passenger ferry sinks in rough seas off Karimun Island in Riau Islands shortly after its sister ship, the Dumai Express 15, ran aground near Moro Island.


Forty of the 295 passengers aboard the Dumai Express died. The ferry had a registered capacity of 273.


None of the 278 passengers aboard the stranded Dumai Express 15 were killed.


The Dumai 10 was sailing from Batam to Dumai, while the Dumai 15 was sailing from Batam to Moro. The head of the National Transportation Safety Committee, Tatang Kurniadi, said the committee was investigating. “Sea transportation safety is one of Freddy’s priorities for his first 100 days in office,” Tatang said, referring to new Transportation Minister Freddy Numberi.



Indonesia stops 17 asylum seekers

Bigpond News, Monday, December 28, 2009, 04:22am


Indonesian police have detained in East Java 17 Afghan and Iraqi asylum seekers bound for Australia.

Indonesian police say they have detained in East Java province 17 Afghan and Iraqi asylum seekers who were trying to reach Australia.


The men - 14 Afghans and three Iraqis - were arrested early Sunday at the coast in Sidoarjo district, district police chief Muhammad Iqbal told Agence France-Presse.


'A wooden boat was waiting there to take them to Australia. We managed to get to the migrants before they could get on to the boat,' he added.


'They had no documents on them and they wanted to go to Australia to seek asylum,' Iqbal said.


'We are still questioning the migrants. We suspect they were brought here by people smugglers,' he added.


Indonesia is a key staging point for smugglers taking Afghans, Sri Lankans and other nationals on a perilous sea journey to Australia.


Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd is under intense political pressure over the issue after a surge in arrivals via Indonesia this year.


Related Article:


47 Sri Lankan Asylum Seekers Leave Indonesia for Australia, Romania


Sunday, December 27, 2009

New Ferry Disaster in Philippines


A Coast Guard diver prepares to search for survivors. (AFP Photo)


Manila. - At least three people died while 22 others were missing after a small inter-island ferry sank in waters south of the Philippine capital, the coast guard said Sunday, the second sea disaster in three days.


The MV Baleno-9, carrying 88 passengers and crew, began listing and went down just before midnight near Batangas City, the coast guard said.


Ships in the area rescued 63 passengers but three bodies were later recovered by the coast guard and 22 are still unaccounted for, coast guard chief Admiral Wilfredo Tamayo said.


Passengers told the coast guard that the roll-on ferry began taking on water from the bow ramp.


This "severely affected the stability of the vessel causing her to badly list and eventually sink," the coast guard report said.


Search vessels and aircraft have been dispatched to locate any more survivors in the area where the ferry went down.


"Hopefully, their flights will not be fruitless and they may find a few more of the missing," said coast guard spokesman Commander Armand Balilo.


He noted that the ferry had sufficient life vests and life rafts and that this may have allowed more of those on board to escape alive.


Tamayo said they could not give an exact reason why the ship apparently began to take on water, before eventually sinking.


"It did not hit anything. Our first finding is it ran into huge waves. This would have put pressure on the (bow) ramp but we still have to get more details. We are getting accounts from the survivors," he told local radio.


Coast guard officials said the captain of the sunken ferry had been rescued and that maritime investigators had interviewed him, but no details had been released.


Sunday's disaster comes barely three days after a wooden passenger boat Catalyn B was hit by a fishing vessel and sank near Manila on Thursday, leaving four dead and 23 missing.


The coast guard recalled staff who were on leave to carry out the two search and rescue operations, Balilo said, adding that no more survivors from Thursday's sinking had been found.


"Our suspicion is growing that they were trapped inside the ship," which sank in seconds according to survivors' accounts, he said.


A special diving team was searching for bodies inside the Catalyn B, he added.


Shipping accidents are common in the Philippines and usually involve poorly-maintained, overloaded ferries which form the backbone of travel between the archipelago's islands.


Ferry passenger numbers in the Philippines usually surge over the Christmas period with many travelling home to visit relatives over the holidays.


The world's deadliest peacetime maritime disaster occurred south of Manila in December 1987 when a ferry carrying Christmas holidaymakers collided with a small oil tanker, killing more than 4,000 people.


AFP


20 pilot whales die on New Zealand beach, 43 saved

The Jakarta Post, The Associated Press | Sun, 12/27/2009 3:12 PM | World

Twenty pilot whales died on a New Zealand beach after stranding bt holiday-makers and conservation workers Sunday managed to coax 43 others back out to sea.

Rescuers monitored the survivors as night fell as they swam away from Colville Beach on North Island's Coromandel peninsula, hoping they would not turn back to the beach.

Department of Conservation workers and hundreds of volunteers helped refloat the 43 whales at high tide. The volunteers covered the stranded mammals in sheets and kept them wet through the day.

"Some 63 pilot whales stranded ... but it looks pretty good, we've got 43 live ones," Department of Conservation ranger Steve Bolten said as the pod swam out to sea.

Bolten said one of the whales may have been sick, or their sonar may have led them into the shallow harbor and they couldn't find their way out again.

Camper Deanna Paddy and her family spent hours in the sea helping the whales, "trying to keep them as wet as possible and comfortable," she told Television New Zealand's One News.

One of the whales she helped died on the beach. "That's nature but we've still got others to try and help. We're just going to give them the best chance we can and hope for the best."

New Zealand has several mass whale strandings around its coastline each summer as they pass by on their way to breeding grounds from Antarctic waters. Scientists so far have been unable to explain why whales become stranded.

President to establish border agency

The Jakarta Post, Sat, 12/26/2009 12:48 PM


JAKARTA: President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono will establish the National Agency on Border Management (BNPP) to better manage the country's border areas with neighboring countries.



Home Ministry spokesman Saut Situmorang told Antara on Friday that the new agency would be established based on a presidential decree to be issued in January.


The new agency, Situmorang said, will coordinate border management issues with all related ministries and agencies including Home Ministry and Foreign Ministry.


The new agency will also coordinate with local administrations in the border areas.


Indonesia shares 3,137-kilometer land borders with three countries, Malaysia, Papua New Guinea and Timor Leste.


Indonesia also shares sea borders with Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam, the Philippines, India, Palau, Australia, Papua New Guinea and Timor Leste. - JP



Banda Aceh being prepared to become hard port city

Antara News, Saturday, December 26, 2009 22:44 WIB


Banda Aceh (ANTARA News) - Banda Aceh is being prepared to have a seaport for very large ships by 2014, Aceh Governor Irwandi Yusuf said here Saturday.


"We are preparing Banda Aceh to have a hard port or a seaport for very large ships, ships too large to pass through the Malacca Strait," the governor said.


He said Banda Aceh was strategically located to serve as point of transit for very large ships and could thus also become a gateway to western Indonesia, a position now held by Medan in North Sumatra.


The existence of such a seaport was expected to boost Aceh province`s economic activities through its multiplier effect, Irwandi said.


The Aceh provincial government now already had a master-plan related to the envisaged hard port which included the construction of various supporting facilities.


Among those facilities would be an oil refinery and an oil storage complex on Sabang Island to supply fuel to feeder ships from China and Singapore.


Irwandi said the hard port plan had been devised also in anticipation of the free trade era beginning in 2012.


"The hard port may not yet be fully ready by 2012 but it must be by 2014," he said.


Related Article:


Reconstruction Spurred Growth: Now Investors Are Needed to Use Aceh’s New Infrastructure



Saturday, December 26, 2009

The science of catastrophe: tsunamis and how they work

Five years ago, 200,000 lives were wiped out. Experts expect another a huge quake under Indonesia.

Residents of Indonesia's Lampulo community pray in memory of the 2004 tsunami near a house that had a boat come to rest on its roof. (Hotli Simanjuntak, EPA / December 26, 2009)

Reuters, December 26, 2009

The devastating 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, caused by a major earthquake under the seafloor north of Aceh in Sumatra, struck five years ago today, killing more than 200,000 people. Scientists say another massive undersea earthquake is long overdue beneath the Mentawai islands in Indonesia and could trigger another deadly tsunami any time.

Here is some of the science behind the process.

How tsunamis occur

In the Sumatra area, tectonic plates meet in a subduction zone -- a place where the boundaries of one plate are forced beneath the other plate. The Indo-Australian plate is sliding northeastward (about 2.8 inches a year) and dipping under the Eurasian plate, along a fault line called the Sunda megathrust which runs southwest from Myanmar down Indonesia toward Timor.

Tremendous geological strain builds over many decades until a section of the megathrust gives way. This rupture causes the oceanic plates beneath Sumatra to lurch forward suddenly, by many yards, in a big earthquake.

If the ocean floor ruptures, it suddenly moves a massive amount of water. This is what happened in the earthquake that caused the deadly Indian Ocean tsunamis of December 2004.

Major quakes that rupture the ocean floor are usually shallow quakes occurring at a depth of less than 44 miles. The quake that caused the 2004 tsunami was about 20 miles below the seafloor.

Tsunamis rise up

On the ocean surface, tsunamis start as a ripple capable of passing under a ship unnoticed, but they become giants as they approach land and the ocean becomes shallow.

A tsunami is not a single wave, but a series of waves. The waves can travel across the ocean at speeds of up to 620 miles an hour, the speed of a jet aircraft.

The vast size of the Pacific Ocean and the large earthquakes associated with the Ring of Fire combine to produce deadly tsunamis in the Asia-Pacific. A tsunami can travel across the Pacific Ocean in less than a day.

As the waves approach land, the ocean recedes dramatically, exposing reefs as the waves draw the water out.

As the trough of the wave drags along the sea floor, slowing it down, the crest rises up dramatically and sends a giant wall of whitewater onto land. The first wave may not be the biggest.

The destructive force of a tsunami comes not from the height of the wave, but from the volume of water moving.

It is as if the ocean floods the coast, smashing everything in its path, and then just as quickly recedes.

Many people who survive the initial wave impact are washed out to sea as the tsunami recedes.

World's worst

  • The 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami was the world's most deadly, killing about 226,000 people, with a wave height about 100 feet.

  • The world's biggest tsunami, caused by a magnitude 8 quake that caused a massive landslide, hit the remote Lituya Bay in Alaska on July 9, 1958. As the wave swept through Lituya Bay, it was forced to rise up, reaching an estimated height of 1,720 feet on the other side of the bay, becoming a mega-tsunami. The sparsely populated bay was devastated, but damage was localized.

  • The Krakatau island volcanic eruption of 1883 generated giant waves reaching heights of 125 feet, killing some 30,000 people. It was the most violent volcanic eruption in modern history.
Sources: Singapore-based Earth Observatory; School of Earth Sciences, University of Melbourne; Australia Pacific Tsunami Warning Center, Hawaii; Tsunami Research Center, USC


Related Articles:

Remembering the tsunami: 'We'll never really forget'

Indonesia's next big quake due under Mentawais

How Natural Disasters Happen:

Earthquakes

Hurricanes

Tornadoes

Tsunami

Volcanoes

Supervolcanoes (Yellowstone)


Friday, December 25, 2009

Cultivated coral reefs now also exported

Antara News, Friday, December 25, 2009 13:01 WIB


Denpasar (ANTARA News) - The coral reefs cultivated by coastal fishermen in Serangan village, Denpasar, have found their way to the export market.


"We have been applying the technique of transplantation in coral reef cultivation and the result is that the products are now exported to Europe," Chairman of the Association of Serangan Fishermen Wayan Patut said here Thursday.


He also said that trading coral reefs is actually against the law, as it harms natural conservation.


However, by applying the transplantation technique in coral reef cultivation, the farmers produced the reefs in such a way that they could be locally marketed and even exported.


"We have been cultivating coral reefs in this way for many years including for natural conservation, in the Serangan waters," one of the farmers said.


"Besides saving nature, the technique also has its economic value, so that the farmers became enthusiastic in both cultivating and rehabilitating coral reefs," he added.


He said he could tell the difference between observed coral reefs from the saleable cultivated ones, by monitoring the reefs and rehabilitating them.


"We have succeeded in cultivating coral reefs of different colors like brown, green, yellow, and other shades," he added.


He said the coral reefs had already been exported to various countries, like the United States, and are also marketed at local markets. Coral reefs are normally used to decorate sea water and fresh water aquariums.



Moving toward marine based development

The Jakarta Post, Sukristijono Sukardjo, Jakarta | Thu, 12/24/2009 9:08 AM | Opinion


Few other nations should be more concerned about the ocean and oceanographic research than Indonesia. Being located in between two oceans, the Pacific and the Indian, the waters around 17,504 islands greatly influences the climate, economy and health of the people of this Republic.

The industrialization during late eighties brought in agriculture and financial services to reinforce an Indonesian economy entirely based up until then on forestry-cultivation and fun-filled beach-centered tourism. However, despite having a 2.7 million square kilometer Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ), the ocean based economic activities contributing to the GNP of Indonesia have been unfortunately insignificant.

Considering the fact that Indonesia has one of the highest populations in the world with access to renewable and non-renewable resources, exploitation of oceanic resources will probably follow as the next phase of the nation’s industrial development. There is a great need for an integrated approach in scientific planning, formulation, implementation and overall management of ocean related activities in Indonesia.

The coastal zone is the prime frontier area to study, as it impacts the livelihood of 60 percent of Indonesians in one-way or another. Monitoring change in the 95,181 km shoreline is an important task for the concerned ministries and research institutions. A GIS-based mapping of the coastline using satellite, aerial photography and real-time ground-truthing is taken up to estimate coastal vulnerability against geological, climatological, biological, chemical and physical extremes.

There is a proposal to set-up a few time-series stations around some major islands and outer islands (e.g. Tual, Kai Kecil islands, etc.). Such marine research stations selected on strong scientific rationale would collect data on all possible oceanographic parameters at regular intervals over a stipulated period. Modeling such data would help develop strategies to effectively mitigate coastal problems.

The livelihoods of a large majority of the Indonesian people depend on fishing and the fisheries industry. Complete biomass evaluation and detailed maps of mangroves, seagrass beds, coral reef and fish stock are still insufficient, some not available.

Mangroves

To overcome this shortfall, efforts are now on to identify new fishing banks through bathymetric survey and satellite information. Construction of artificial reefs, mariculture and mangrove rehabilitation and/or restoration are encouraged.

Continuous monitoring of chlorophyll content, sea surface temperature and current pattern are studied to maximize the resource products. Setting up of an integrated coastal zone management framework involving impact assessment certification mechanism and an efficient hazard and crisis mitigation group are being actively considered.

A substantial part of the protein needs of Indonesia come from the sea through captured fisheries — 2,500 fish species have been identified and some of these of commercial value worldwide. A good demand for filleted and other value-added forms of fish should excite the fishing industry and home industry.

Biotechnology and sea ranching mechanism can ensure high food quality and add value to the product. Grounds for deep-water shrimp trawling and possibilities to develop technology for better fish preservation are now explored. The seafood technology arena, in particular, can create a lot of job opportunities. Extracts from marine organisms can also contribute a substantial part of the country’s drug needs.

Indonesia is insisting on well-equipped laboratories and trained human resources to capture the intellectual property rights and other commercial possibilities in the field of bio-prospecting. Indonesian marine invertebrate biotechnology products have a potential value of US$340-780 million per year, and would constitute 5 percent of the world’s total output.

As a fundamental measure, the vast EEZ and the Sunda and Sahul shelf need to be explored in detail to complete geological, chemical, biological and physical mapping. Understanding the submarine landslides, sea floor tectonics and its effect on stability of islands coastlines are of great significance.

Indonesia straddles the ring of fire, has vast continental shelves, and in consonance with Article 76 of the Unclos Convention, geological and geophysical data is necessary for demarcate extension of legal continental shelves. An intensive exploration to identify maritime resources within the EEZ for hydrocarbon potential, seamount cobalt rich crust and phosphorus, hydrothermal metal deposits of the mid-oceanic ridge and associated bioactive compounds is necessary.

Another area in which Indonesia is interested to harvest renewable energy from wind, waves, currents, tides, and from large temperature difference that exist in the water le-vels within a short distance from the shore. The Indian Ocean, stretching from east of Sumatera to south of Java going to West part of Indonesia holds great promise.

Indonesia is lucky to have the Wallace Line which runs from Lombok strait between Borneo and Sulawesi to the Sulu Sea in the Philippines, marking the boundary between the Asian and Australasian faunas of Laurasian and Gondwanan ancestry. Marine creatures (e.g. Coelacanth fish) and pelagic fish e.g. Spermonde islands, are phenomenal to science. Understanding the processes of generation of new oceanic crust at the Central Indian Ridge would be interesting to obtain fundamental information on mantle melt behavior and high-grade sulphide metal deposits.

A host of worms and colorful tubes amazingly occur at this extremely hot (>200o C) deep-sea environment. The genetic adaptations of these organisms biologically in the laboratory may prove commercially potential and academically significant. Studying various dimensions and dynamics of the Central Indian Ridge-Indian Oceans should prove rewarding e.g. the discovery of giant, deep-sea -volcano in the offshore Bengkulu. Oceans regulates climate by absorbing much of the atmospheric carbon.

Hence understanding the biogeochemical environment that controls and relates oceanic productivity and atmospheric composition can help climate prediction. Increased research on air-sea interaction processes and stimulation of ocean-atmosphere coupling would contribute substantially to enhance weather and climate prediction ability.

To this end, Indonesia is now integrated with an international campaign to understand the above delicate aspects. WOC2009 is the milestone of Indonesian contribution to ocean-climate change issues.

By deploying argo floats, data-buoys, tide gauges and sediment traps, Indonesia is poised to generate a wealth of information from her waters. It is proposed to study the Sunda and Sahul shelf and Wallace’s Line seas in detail as the oceanographic parameters of this area greatly influence the tropical climate, the two oceans: Pacific and Indian, and the resultant economy.

From social points also, Indonesian waters are expected to have a wealth of history submerged, myth and legendary. Scientific investigation to catalogue marine archaeological sites of Indonesian waters and trace maritime history through research may bring out unsung pages of culture and commerce in the past.

In order to make use of the ocean in a sustainable way, ministries and institutions in Indonesia should take much interest on the issue, said President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono at the address on the Coral Triangle Initiative Summit 2009. Dewan Kelautan Indonesia (The Indonesian Maritime Council), as a national coordination committee in ocean sciences is being set up by presidential decree for this purpose. Being a responsible contributor to global ocean research campaigns (e.g. Manado Ocean Declaration 2009), Indonesia is on the cusp of qualifying as a hub of marine research activities in the Indonesia waters, between Indian and Pacific oceans.

It is believed that only through visible, rational and responsible marine scientific activities; Indonesia can take advantage of her enormous geographical and strategic potential. If approached judiciously, oceanic activities could become a pillar of Indonesia economy in near future, following the success of Japan, Australia, South Korea, Maldives, and Mauritius that use ocean life to fuel their economy.

The writer is a Professor of Mangrove Ecology at the Center for Oceanological Research and Development, Indonesian Institute of Science (LIPI).

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