Another earthquake shakes the capital

JAKARTA (JP): An earthquake measuring 5.5 on the Richter scale hit the capital on Friday morning.

No damages or fatalities were reported.

Many Jakartans were unaware of the jolt, which according to the Meteorology and Geophysics Agency (BMG) lasted for about 10 seconds at 9:17 a.m.

The light shock was felt mainly by those working or residing in tall buildings.

An earthquake with a magnitude of 5.1 on the Richter scale rocked the city on Wednesday last week. It destroyed dozens of houses in Bogor and Sukabumi, the epicenter of the earthquake.

"Although the (Friday's) earthquake had a stronger magnitude than the last one, the impact was much less because its epicenter was in the ocean," BMG head Sri Diharto told Elshinta radio station.

Sri added that the epicenter of the tectonic quake was somewhere in the Sunda Strait, some 200 kilometers west of Jakarta.

Sri said he also had no idea about the earthquake until a reporter from a Japan-based media called him for confirmation about the quake.

"I was in my office, which is a one-story building. Based on the call, we then rushed to the BMG (recording) office and found out that there had been an earthquake," he said.

Bambang Trimulyo, an employee at the 20-story Antara building in Central Jakarta, told The Jakarta Post: "I was standing on the top floor (of my office) looking out a window when I noticed my door moving back and forth and creaking."

A research executive at PT Insightindo Arya Dharma Elvina Afny, who was on the 12th floor of the 17-story Wisma Nugra Santana building on Jl. Sudirman, said she was working in front of her computer when the quake hit.

"I felt the quake but I ignored it," Elvina told the Post.

A researcher at the BMG Jakarta office, Fauzi, said the quake was caused by an accumulation of energy caused by a shift of two tectonic plates, which meet under the Indian Ocean near the southern part of Java.

Fauzi said due to the close distance between the capital and the epicenter of the previous earthquake, it was possible that the capital would be the epicenter of an earthquake of low magnitude.

"If it does occur, it will be only at about one on the Richter scale," Fauzi told the Post.

However, Fauzi said that it would be difficult to give any forewarning.

"It is very difficult to predict when an earthquake will occur," Fauzi said.

In Bandung, chief of the Bandung Institute of Technology (ITB) earthquake laboratory Nanang I. Puspito warned that strong quakes could occur.(08/25/edt)