Jakarta Flooding
Few great cities flood as regularly or as seriously as Jakarta. Home to millions, built on a swampy delta, and sinking fast, the Indonesian capital faces a flood problem so severe the country is building a new capital elsewhere.
A city built to flood
Jakarta sits on a low, flat delta where thirteen rivers drain toward the Java Sea. Much of the city is at or near sea level, some of it already below it. When the monsoon unloads, water pours off the highlands, backs up in the rivers, and has nowhere to go — a recipe for near-annual flooding.
Why it keeps getting worse
- Extreme monsoon rain. The wet-season peak, around December to February, brings torrential downpours that overwhelm rivers and drains.
- Land subsidence. Heavy groundwater extraction has caused parts of Jakarta to sink by several metres over recent decades — among the fastest-sinking cities in the world. As the land drops below sea level, flooding worsens and drainage fails.
- Urban growth. Rapid, dense development has paved over the ground that once absorbed rain and clogged the waterways that once carried it away.
- Coastal pressure. Rising seas and tidal flooding attack the sinking northern districts from the other side.
Major flood disasters
Jakarta has suffered repeated catastrophic floods, including severe events in 2007, 2013, and on New Year's Day 2020, when extraordinary rainfall submerged much of the metropolitan area, displaced tens of thousands, and killed dozens. Each event follows the same grim pattern: intense monsoon rain meeting a sinking, over-built delta.
What is being done
Responses include a giant coastal sea wall and land-reclamation plans, river dredging and normalisation, and efforts to curb groundwater pumping. Most dramatically, Indonesia is relocating its capital to a new city, Nusantara, in Borneo — driven in significant part by Jakarta's flooding and subsidence. For the wider context, see Indonesia severe weather.