Amateur Radio Responding to Latest Indonesian Earthquakes

Soejat Harto, YB6HB, and Zulkarman Syafrin, YC6PLG, were among Indonesian Amateur Radio Emergency Service volunteers and a medical team deployed to Nias Island March 28 following earthquakes that have claimed upward of 2000 lives. At least two major underwater earthquakes near Nias Island in the northern Sumatra region occurred March 28. The first was a magnitude 8.2 earthquake. The second, which occurred nearly simultaneously with the first but at a slightly different site, was measured at magnitude 8.7. There have also been several smaller tremors. Harto is a medical doctor and a vice chairman of the Organization of Amateur Radio for Indonesia (ORARI) of North Sumatra Province, while Syarfrin is an IARES member. Nias Island is about 350 miles southeast of the epicenter of the December 2004 earthquake that generated a disastrous tsunami. Telecommunications and electrical power in parts of several cities in North Sumatra Province have been out since the December tsunami, and the latest events cut off regular telecommunications between Nias Island and the rest of Indonesia. Numerous underwater earthquakes have occurred along Sunda Trench--the boundary between the Australia Plate and Sunda Plate.

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