[물이 밀려온다] The tide came, the village sank

◀ again ▶

The World Meteorological Organization announced today that the global average concentration of carbon dioxide last year was 415 ppm.

The concentration of greenhouse gases has also reached a new high, leading to global warming and rising sea levels.

The video you see now was shot in the northern part of the island of Java, not far from Jakarta, the capital of Indonesia.

Due to climate change and environmental destruction, the sea water rises and the land sinks, submerging the entire village in the sea.

Journalist Min-wook Kim of MBC’s Climate Environment Team is currently covering the scene, so let’s go straight to the scene to see how bad the situation is.

◀ Report ▶

I am in Bedono village in a region called Demak, about 400 kilometers east of Jakarta, Indonesia.

This orange-roofed building behind me was originally an elementary school.

The word here is ‘SD Negri Bedono 1’, which means it is the No. 1 by Bedono.

But this school is now closed.

How come?

Take a look here to see why.

The school began to be submerged by sea water.

As the school building was partially submerged by the sea, classes could no longer be held here, so the school closed two years ago and the students moved to another school.

Shall we enter the classroom?

Fortunately, it is low tide right now, so the water does not enter the classroom.

Originally, it is said that when the tide comes in, sea water fills the interior of the classroom in this way.

Let’s take a look at the classroom floor.

The barnacles began to cover the floor.

Normally, when the water rises, it means that the water will fill the classroom.

At the bottom of this school building is the space that was originally used as a warehouse.

But that warehouse is now always full of seawater.

If you take a look from this side, there is a building that used to be a toilet.

However, as the sea level rises and the ground inside the toilet sinks, the toilet is now angled slightly towards the sea.

And here’s Mr. Lee Kwan, helping us with our coverage here.

(Hello.)

“Hello.”

Lee Kwan is a fisherman and conservationist.

Mr. Yi Quan also graduated from this school.

It is said that when Mr. Lee Kwan graduated from this school in 2000, a total of 180 students from 6 classes took classes here.

However, the students say they are now attending another school a little further down the coast.

According to Yi Quan, the coast was originally about 1.5 kilometers from the school.

It is said that even at high tide the sea did not reach less than 100 meters from the school.

However, in the 20 years since Mr. Lee Kwan graduated, a drastic change has occurred and the school has been flooded and closed.

Today we took a boat with Mr. Lee Quan to cover the flooded forest villages across the road.

I was able to meet the people who still live there.

The content we’ve covered here will be delivered to viewers as soon as a series of sea level rise reports when we return to Korea.

This is MBC News’ Minwook Kim from Indonesia demo so far.

Video Coverage: Young-geun Jang / Video Editing: Daye Ryu

MBC News awaits your report 24 hours a day.

▷ Tel 02-784-4000
▷ Email [email protected]
▷ KakaoTalk report @mbc