Toward an Integrated Tsunami Disaster Mitigation: Lessons Learned from Previous Tsunami Events in Indonesia

In the last two years, the tsunami phenomenon has become a very serious issue in Indonesia. The 2004 Sumatra tsunami caused 130,000 casualties with another 37,000 missing, presumed dead, and financial loss suffered reached $ 4.3 billion. A tsunami struck the Pangandaran area again, West Java Province, on July 17, 2006, which caused 668 casualties with another 45 missing and financial loss reaching $ 44.7 million. The damage to these infrastructures and lives clearly shows that disaster mitigation and disaster countermeasure efforts are still not running well. This is becoming the background to the urgent need for integrated tsunami disaster mitigation to build a well-prepared coastal disaster community in the near future.