Aceh Tsunami Museum Preserves Memory and Disaster Education

RRI.CO.ID, Banda Aceh - The Aceh Tsunami Museum commemorates the devastating Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami on Sunday, December 26, 2004. The museum preserves the memory of victims while supporting disaster education and emergency evacuation preparedness.

The earthquake struck Aceh at around 7:58 a.m. Western Indonesia Time, reaching magnitude 9.3 on the Richter scale. The resulting tsunami devastated coastal areas facing the Indian Ocean, with Aceh suffering the heaviest impact.

The disaster claimed around 170,000 lives, prompting the creation of the museum as a memorial. It also serves as an educational center and an emergency evacuation facility during future disasters.

The Aceh Tsunami Museum was established on Monday, February 23, 2009, following an international design competition held in 2007. Architect Ridwan Kamil designed the building as a symbolic tribute to the 2004 tsunami.

The museum houses around 6,038 collections covering ethnographic, archaeological, biological, technological, and artistic materials. Other collections include geological, philological, historical, numismatic, heraldic, and audiovisual materials.

The collections are rotated every six months, allowing visitors to experience different displays over time. Each exhibition presents around 1,300 collections across the Aceh House, temporary exhibition, and permanent exhibition areas.

Visitors enter through a dimly lit narrow corridor designed to create an emotional atmosphere. Another space, The Light of God, presents the names of hundreds of thousands of tsunami victims.

Located on Sultan Iskandar Muda Street in Baiturrahman, Banda Aceh, the museum stands near Baiturrahman Grand Mosque. The museum is also adjacent to the Kerkhof Dutch Cemetery and offers an important historical destination for visitors.