NTT Governor: 5 People Killed in Nagekeo Earthquake
Five people have been reported killed as a result of a 7.7 magnitude earthquake centred in Nagekeo Regency, East Nusa Tenggara (NTT). The five victims were spread across Sikka and Manggarai regencies in NTT.
“The provisional death toll from the 7.7 magnitude earthquake centred in Mbay, Nagekeo Regency, stands at five people,” said NTT Governor Melki Laka Lena during a press conference with officials from the Regional Disaster Management Agency (BPBD), the National Search and Rescue Agency (Basarnas), the Indonesian National Armed Forces (TNI) and the Indonesian National Police (Polri) at the NTT Regional Police Headquarters on Saturday (15/8/2026).
Melki detailed that two people were found dead in Sikka and three others in Manggarai. He stressed that data regarding the earthquake victims is still being confirmed.
“We will verify the cause again, and once again this is indeed related to the rubble, as we can see from the videos circulating. In Sikka there was a similar incident, and in Manggarai as well,” said Melki.
“The data we currently have shows five people have died,” added the Golkar Party politician.
Melki explained that further data on damage and earthquake victims will be updated through the NTT BPBD Operations Control Centre (Pusdalops). He pledged to provide updates based on the results of monitoring at the disaster site today.
“We will fly directly to Flores using an aircraft from the Regional Police and conduct inspections. Hopefully we can obtain detailed damage information by this afternoon, because the existing data is still preliminary and cannot yet be presented in full. Officers are still in the field. We will confirm first,” said Melki.
Meanwhile, NTT Regional Police Chief Inspector General Rudi Darmoko stated that all leaders of the Regional Leadership Coordination Forum (Forkompimda) will also immediately move to the earthquake-affected areas of Flores. “We will make an all-out effort with the resources currently available. That is why this afternoon we will go down together with Forkompimda directly to the location to monitor the disaster-affected areas,” said Rudi.