MULTI-RISK OF DISASTERS IN PARANGTRITIS COASTAL AREA, INDONESIA

Djati Mardiatno*)1,2, Sunarto2, Muh Aris Marfai2

1
2

Geography Faculty, Gadjah Mada University, Yogyakarta, Indonesia

Research Centre for Disasters, Gadjah Mada University, Yogyakarta, Indonesia

*) corresponding author, email: mardiatno@geo.ugm.ac.id

Abstract
As a popular tourism destination in Indonesia, Parangtritis is under multi-hazards threat, such as
earthquakes, tsunamis, and flooding. This paper aims at observing some possible hazards in
Parangtritis and to analyze a multi-risk potential with regard to the multi-hazard events in that area. A
semi-quantitative analysis is carried out to asses the multi-risk potential in combination with rapid
interviews to locals in order to know people perspectives about multi-risk phenomenon. In general,
Parangtritis area has a high multi-risk potential due to various hazards and vulnerability level. People
have already understood that their living area is in risk of disasters, thus they also have adapted this
condition by applying several local wisdoms during their life.

Keywords: multi-risk, semi-quantitative analysis, local wisdom, Parangtritis, Indonesia

Introduction
The Southern coast of Java Island is a part of the Indonesia archipelago that faces directly the
subduction zone between the India-Australian Plate and Eurasian Plate. The subduction zone is situated
in the Indian Ocean. Collision between these plates results in the endogenic activity in that zone being
very dynamic. As a consequence, this area is very vulnerable to earthquakes. If earthquakes take place
under seawater and there is a vertical dislocation in the seafloor, it will result in tsunamis.
Parangtritis coastal area is an interesting recreation area in south coast of Yogyakarta Special Region.
The recreational objects are natural landscape, spiritual, and cultural. The whole coastal area of
Parangtritis is an interesting place due to the physical environment conditions and the spiritual as well as
cultural activities for tourism. Recently, this area is being developed to be more existing tourism area.
Coastal alluvial plain of Parangtritis contains of beach, sand dune, and back-swamp. The coastal alluvial
plain is composed of alluvium in varies textures such as gravel, sand, and clay of Quaternary age. They
are almost flat to rolling/hilly topography with the elevation ranging from 0-15 meters above mean sea
level. Most of the beach is almost flat in the eastern part of the area, and becomes gradually steeper
toward the west. A few meters of cliffs can be recognized in the steeper part of the beach. To the
landward of the beach, a large area is covered by sand dune in several types such as barchan and

longitudinal dunes. They are varies in shape, length, height and width, with gently to steep slopes.
Landscape of Parangtritis coastal area can be seen in Figure 1.

PARANGTRITIS COASTAL AREA

Yogyakarta - Indonesia

1 km

Figure 1. Landscape of Parangtritis Coastal Area

In 2006, there were two hazards that occurred simultaneously in this area, i.e. earthquake and tsunami.
Both hazards resulted in some fatalities, such as in buildings, infrastructures, agricultural land, and
influenced local people economic activities. Beside those hazards, a part of this area is regularly affected
by flood hazard as well.
The effects of tsunami and earthquake as well as flood are sometimes disastrous. Spatial plan without
any consideration toward all disasters create unsafe area, thus it is necessary to assess hazard and risk
factor of the coastal area. A spatially oriented risk assessment has three main characteristics, i.e. multi-

hazard oriented, only those risks with spatial relevance are considered, and only collective risks that
threaten a community as a whole are relevant (Greiving, 2006).
Due to the possibilities of previously mentioned hazards, it is necessary to know a multi-hazards
potential in Parangtritis as a primary factor for multi risk analysis. This paper aims at observing some
possible hazards in Parangtritis and to analyze a multi-risk potential with regard to the multi-hazard
events in that area.

Method
A semi-quantitative analysis is carried out to asses the multi-risk potential in combination with rapid
interviews to locals in order to know people perspectives about multi-risk phenomenon. In order to
assess a multi-risk potential, it is necessary to observe earthquake and tsunami hazard potential as well
as flood hazard potential in a research area. If earthquake occur on the land, it becomes a direct hazard.
If earthquake occur in the seafloor, it possibly generates tsunami. Opak River will contribute to flood
hazard. In combination with socio-economic data, all hazards will produce risk for each hazard.
Integration between earthquake risk, tsunami risk, and flood risk will generate a more comprehensive
risk assessment result, i.e. a multi-risks assessment (Figure 2).

Earthquake

Land

Seafloor

Tsunami

Parangtritis Coastal Area

Opak River

Flood

Socio-economic condition

Hazard II

Hazard I

Hazard III

Vulnerability

Damage

Risk I

Risk III
Risk II

Integration

Multi-Risks
Figure 2. Theoretical Framework of the Research

The zones prone to earthquakes can be determined with regard to the possibility of earthquake
occurrence in a specified area. The possibility is based on the past earthquake events, while past
earthquake data can be easily accessed from USGS or BMKG (meteorology, climatology, and
geophysics agency in Indonesia) websites. Tsunami risk is determined by tsunami impact data of past
tsunami (year 2006 event). Flood risk is determined with regard to possibilities of flood inundation
during rainy season every year. This research applied a simple method to assess a multi-risk potential to
disasters. Maps analysis is also carried out by merging all risk maps. A multi-risk map is generated as
the result of that integration, which informs a number of unified risks.

Results and Discussions

Earthquake risk
Many earthquakes were happened in the southern part of Yogyakarta region, including in Parangtritis.
The last huge earthquake was occurred in Parangtritis on 27 of May 2006. Based on local authority data
(Bappeda Bantul, 2007), the number of casualties exceeded four deadly people. The number of serious
damage houses was 537 and medium damage houses were 523.
Considering to the landform condition, PSBA (2009) generated earthquake hazard zones for this area
(Figure 3). As shown in that figure, it is clear that the lowland area of Parangtritis is located within a
high hazard zone to earthquake. Thus, earthquake risk is possibly high in this area as well.

EARTHQUAKE HAZARD MAP

OF PARANGTRITIS AREA

HAZARD
LOW
MEDIUM
HIGH

Figure 3. Earthquake hazard zone of Parangtritis coastal area (PSBA, 2009)

Earthquake 26 of May 2006 was not only destroyed many infrastructures, but it caused some economic
activities being collapsed. The biggest collapsed sector was settlement, followed by social sector,
infrastructures, and tourism. Based on tourism agency data in 2007, the numbers of tourists decrease
from 1.341.931 in 2005 to 795.432 in 2006. It influenced local people income from the tourism sector.

Tsunami risk
This area was affected by Java tsunami in 2006. That tsunami was triggered by an earthquake located at
the south-west part of Pangandaran (West Java) in Indian Ocean. The impact of that tsunami reached
this area and resulted in some fatalities such as damaged small shops and paddy field area inundation.
The impact map of tsunami in this area is shown in Figure 4.

Figure 4. Tsunami Impact Map of Parangtritis Coastal Area (Cahyadi et al, 2007)

As shown in Figure 4, it is clear that tsunami mostly inundated non built-environment areas. However,
in some parts, especially at the area adjacent to the shops, small hotels, and paddy field, tsunami wave
penetrated farther inland. It is related to the local morphology of that part, which are located at the very
low elevation. Fortunately, there was no victim due to tsunami event at that time, although three people
had injuries.

Flood risk
This coastal area is also regularly affected by flood, especially in wet season. Flood occurs in the north
part of Parangtritis, which is caused by Opak River and sometimes cause damages on the road and
agricultural land (see Figure 5). This part is used as an agricultural land, and being planted with paddy,
onion, vegetables, chilly, and some other crops. As the north part of this area is relatively closed, water
is likely trapped here due to unavailability of channel to drain water from this part. At least, this part is
always flooded once a year.

PARANGTRITIS COASTAL AREA

Yogyakarta - Indonesia

Flood hazard zone

Figure 5. Flood hazard zone of Parangtritis coastal area

During the flood period, people are not able to go away from their villages through the main road. They
have to go through another farther road when they want to go outside. Flood height on the road exceed
about half meter, and inundated water depth is deeper on the cropland. Some crops (e.g. onion and
paddy) are being inundated resulting in failure of harvest.

Multi-risks and Disaster Risk Reduction

With regard to some possible natural hazards, it is necessary to generate a multi-risk map, which
consists of multi-risk zones due to some related hazards. As shown in Figure 6, it can be seen the zones
of multi-risk area in Parangtritis. It can be seen in Figure 6 that there are two high multi-risk zones, i.e. a
high risk zone to earthquake and flood and a high risk zone to earthquake and tsunami. As both multirisk zones are quite populated areas, it is recommended to conduct more detailed risk assessment at
those places.

PARANGTRITIS COASTAL AREA

Yogyakarta - Indonesia

High risk zone to earthquake and flood

High risk zone to earthquake and tsunami

Figure 6. Proposed multi-risk zones of disasters in Parangtritis coastal area

In general, people understand that their living place is under disaster threats, especially to earthquake
and tsunami. It is reasonable since they were just influenced by both hazards in 2006. They have also
already understood that flooding is a real threat during wet season, thus they have already adapted with
this condition. For instance, they applied surjan agricultural systems, i.e. by making higher rows for

planting certain crops, such as onion, peanut, chilly, and vegetables, while the lower rows are normally
planted by paddy.
In order to reduce multi-risk of disasters, it is necessary to carry out some efforts which are possibly
done by all stakeholders in this area. In general, all efforts can be divided into two approaches, i.e. hard
engineering and social engineering. A hard engineering approach should be applied with regard to some
considerations, such as buildings and infrastructures renovation must be done by using local capacity. It
should be noted here that some selected existing buildings or infrastructures can be utilized for multirisk reduction program. New buildings or infrastructures development should be avoided in order to
eliminate development cost, though this way can only be carried out in consideration to local
government program. All buildings and infrastructures for multi-risk reduction program are local assets
which should be utilized as multi-functional assets. This way is an alternative to eliminate assets
inefficiency, thus all selected objects can be utilized for more productive activities during pre-disaster
phase.
The social engineering approach can be done by capacity building program, such as Training of Trainers
(ToT) program for locals as well as an education for increasing people awareness to multi-risk. As
PSBA (2007) did in some pilot project locations, ToT program is very useful to prepare local people in
case of multi-hazards events. This program and followed by a drill is able to change people perception
to disaster and increase their awareness. All local institutions (see Table 1) can be utilized in conducting
the multi-risks reduction socialization program as well. Each groups are also expected to coordinate
local people in case of of hazard occurs.
Table 1. Social Institutions in Parangtritis
No
Institutions
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.

Pramuka Gudep (Scouting)

Karang Taruna (Youngster Group)
LSM (NGO)
PKK
Dasa Wisma

Total
(group)
12
12
1
12
11

Source: Monografi Desa Parangtritis (2007)

Moreover, socialization using such pamphlets, brochures, posters, and simple guide books as well as
films about disaster is quite effective to educate local people in order to open their mind about disasters
and multi-risk phenomena. As explained by Mardiatno (2008), education is a primary key to reduce
disasters. The disaster education programs are more effective for children as they will easily accept all
interesting information.

Both risk reduction programs should be done as a complementary program, thus a multi-risk assessment
is able to provide a more complete description about related risks. Multi-risk reduction program will be
more valuable in supporting regional development program, especially at a local (village) level. This
application should be conducted with regard to statistical data availability.

Concluding Remarks
The research on multi-risk assessment to disasters in Parangtritis coastal area was accomplished. Based
on the results, it can be concluded that Parangtritis coastal area is threaten by multi-risk of disasters, i.e.
earthquake, tsunami, and flooding. A number of efforts should be carried out in order to reduce those
risks, for instance by renovating some infrastructures, trainings for local people, and disaster education.

Acknowledgments
The authors would like to thank to Research Centre for Disaster (PSBA) Gadjah Mada University for
data support and a partial funding to do this research.

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