Learning from past earthquake disasters: The need for knowledge management system to enhance infrastructure resilience in Indonesia

Abstract

Indonesia lies at the region where Indo-Australian, Eurasian, Pacific and Philippines global tectonic plates meet. In the last 30 years, Indonesia has experienced catastrophic earthquake disasters, causing thousands of loss of life and major infrastructure damage. Since the 2004 devastating Sumatra-Andaman tsunamigenic earthquake, knowledge derived from various disaster experiences regarding infrastructure resilience have been improving. Yet disasters such as the recent 2018 Lombok and Palu earthquakes remain devastating. An investigation on how knowledge on past earthquakes have been managed and utilized to promote better resilient infrastructure in Indonesia is conducted. Lessons are extracted from 5 significant earthquakes causing major damage through compilation and analysis of scientific publications and reports on field surveys, works and existing policies. Factors that keep contributing to the failure of buildings and infrastructure include lack of understanding of local hazard situation, incompliance to seismic resistant codes and standards for buildings and infrastructure, problematic soil condition, and collateral hazards such as tsunami, liquefaction, ground subsidence, landslides, rock avalanche which are adding to the complexity of the seismic hazard. The scarcity of information and knowledge on the performance on resilience of infrastructure during earthquakes in Indonesia limits knowledge-based decision making in the planning, development and operation of resilient infrastructure. This study calls for the development of a knowledge management system for earthquake resilient infrastructure in Indonesia, to save more lives and to reduce economic disruptions due to infrastructure damages, and thus contribute to the sustainable development goals achievement.