World Vision staff members in the Indonesian capital Jakarta teamed up Friday to organise and distribute emergency relief aid after severe floods hit the city at dawn. Hundreds of thousands of people were forced to flee their homes in a desperate attempt to find a safe place to shelter.

At least 20 people have been reported killed in the disaster and 340,000 have been made homeless while all business activities in the city have ground to a halt. The floods have been described as the worst to hit Jakarta in over five years, worse than the severe floods which overwhelmed the capital city in February 2002.

Reports show that about a half of the city's areas were completely flooded and nine million residents are now on its highest level of alert.

All World Vision Indonesia projects in Jakarta, which are mostly based in slum areas, have suffered from the floods.

These Area Development Programmes, or ADP's, are currently funded by international support offices such as World Vision Canada, Singapore and Japan. Current estimates from the World Vision National Office show that some 3000-5000 sponsored children may have been impacted.

The first distribution, which consisted of blankets, sarongs and raincoats were delivered to 600 affected families in Cawang neighbourhoods.