A Group of IPB Students Identified Dangerous Spot in Sipanjang Cave, Bogor
Tracking in caves is currently popular program and has become special tourism activity in Indonesia. Caves are a part of nature tourism, or “ecotourism” , that is capable of attracting tourists. Caves are important to the tourism industry because it develops rapidly in developing countries, including Indonesia where hundreds of caves every year are developed for that purpose. The awareness behind turning caves into a source of natural tourism reaches far past the borders of mere economics. This activity has a fascination in the form of adventure action and challenge for the devotees. This causes more and more enthusiasts cave search activities, both from experienced and new. However, this recreational activities perceived as involving a high degree of risk. Therefore, to ensure that all visitors understand the potential hazards and to reduce the chance of injuries special skills are required.
One of which is Sipanjang Cave, located in in the karst of Gunung Cibodas, Ciampea, Bogor. It is one of top cave tourist attraction. Due to the high demand of quality service, in modern society, it shows that caves are very popular tourist attractions. There are plenty of people who would like to discover the wonders of an underground world. Therefore, planning, organisation and control of business activities of this cave tourism should be well-prepared.
We should first of all complete all the strengthening and development works to be able to understand when the proposed cave is ready to be turned into a tourist object. We must assess and identify the potential hazards and causative factors to accidents occur for visitors of Sipanjang Cave, consider all the potential hazards and how to minimize it.
To respond the above program Rozaqa Wahyurianto Adityatama student of Bogor Agricultural University (IPB), who was also chairman for Program Kreativitas Mahasiswa bidang Penelitian (PKM-P Student Creativity Program for Research), together with his team consisted of Puji Rahayu, Winy Rosalina Putri, Rifky Edo Herlangga and Merisa Nur Azmi implemented research program to identify the potential hazards and causative factors to accidents in Sipanjang Cave.
"The cave exploration has become a Special Interest Tourism (SIT) activities, but this activity is very risky. Therefore, risk assessment is really required, this assessment can help us identify where we need to look at certain risks and these particular risky activities. It is expected that we will be able to reduce and anticipate fatal accidents for the tour guides, "said Rozaqa.
Sipanjang Cave is one of Caves that exist in karst area of Kapur Ciampea. Gunung Kapur has become one of the tourist attraction in Bogor but Sipanjang Cave has not yet been developed yet. This Cave is generally visited only by the caver but it has not been opened for general visitors, as the Cave management does not provide appropriate equipment to search this Cave.
"Sipanjang Cave has many attractions for cave tourism. One of which, as it has 2 vertical cave mouths. The cave is a popular vertical caving destination. The mouth of the cave used as PKM group target object by is the vertical mouth of the cave as deep as 10 meters depth with the length of the aisle of approximately 60 meters. There are large number of aerial roots of the banyan tree which grows around the mouth of the cave. Inside there are cave ornaments like stalactites, stalagmites, pillars. In fact there are many bats living in the cave, "he said..
In analyzing the potential hazards and risks contained in Cave Sipanjang this team using the method of JSA (Job Safety Analysis) and Risk Assessment. A job safety analysis (JSA) is a procedure which helps integrate accepted safety and health principles and practices into a particular task or job operation. In a JSA, each basic step of the job is to identify potential hazards and to recommend the safest way to do the job. Other terms used to describe this procedure are job hazard analysis (JHA) and job hazard breakdown.
Risk assessment is the determination of quantitative or qualitative estimate of risk related to a well-defined situation and a recognized threat (also called hazard). Quantitative risk assessment requires calculations of two components of risk (R): the magnitude of the potential loss (L), and the probability (p) that the loss will occur. Although attention has been given to the classification or quantification of inadvertent or accidental human errors made by operators, there has been little practical advice on how managers can successfully address deliberate breaches, or violations, of safety rules and procedures.
"JSA with proactive methods is used to identify potential spot hazards to Cave researchers. A risk assessment is a vital element for health and safety management and its main objective is to determine the measures required to comply with statutory duty under the Health and Safety at Work Act and associated regulations by reducing the level of incidents/accidents. Being proactive means thinking and acting ahead of anticipated events. To be proactive, you'll need to plan for potential problems, solve problems instead of dwelling on them, prioritize more effectively, and assess your current method of tackling tasks to make improvements. In determining the hazardous spot we have discussed with a team of 8 people, the risk assessment method is used to identify the possible risks posed by the hazard (JSA result data) resulting in a loss effect, "said Winy, a member of the Conservation team and students Forest Resources and Ecotourism.
During the process analysis, Hazard Identification Sources such as the basic tool for Cave researcher, the complicated construction of cave interiors, cave floor conditions, weather, health, rock ruins, cave-dwelling creatures that navigate without eyes, and poisonous gas.
The research program carried out by the group of students revealed there are many dangerous spots on Sipanjang Cave. For example, in the mouth of the Cave which is 10 meters above the floors might cause visitors to fall down and experience broken bones.
"For example, any Caver must know what they're dealing with or risk great danger in vertical mouth cave, as it is around 10 meters deep therefore they have to be careful. Falls are a common type of caving accident. Slow down, pay attention to where you are going and what you are touching. Avoid running, jumping, and other sudden moves. Prepare appropriate equipment (the result of JSA). Falling is a normal experience for young children, but falling from a significant 10 meters height or onto a hard surface can be dangerous. Falls from height are responsible for many serious and fatal injuries. Falls from more than 20 feet have historically been triaged to trauma centers, but even low-level falls can cause serious head injuries. Risk assessment scale will be applied to the likelihood of a hazard and the severity of outcome for physical and psychological injuries. "said Winy.
The scores obtained are used to determine the priority scale of risk prevention. There are four categories: critical with red, serious code with orange color, moderate with yellow and tolerate code with green colour code. "From the observation result there are thirteen potentially dangerous spots, there are 4 spot critical, 1 spot serious, 5 spot moderate, and 3 spot tolerate," said Winy. (Wied)
