Quakes jolt NTT and Sumatra, many refugees flee in panic
Quakes jolt NTT and Sumatra, many refugees flee in panic
The Jakarta Post, Kupang, Jakarta
A strong earthquake jolted East Nusa Tenggara province on Monday,
slightly damaging scores of buildings and causing local residents
to flee in panic. No injuries were reported.
Earlier, an earthquake had also rocked Lampung and the
neighboring province of Bengkulu on Sunday night, but there were
no reports of structural damage or injuries.
Monday's quake, measuring 5.7 on the Richter scale, shook West
Timor at around 9:51 a.m. The epicenter was in the Timor Sea,
some 72 kilometers southeast of Kupang city, volcanologists said.
It caused cracks in scores of buildings in Kupang and shook
most others in the city, Rote Ndao and the southern part of West
Timor.
"The strongest tremor was probably felt by residents in
southern Timor Island covering the regencies of Kupang, South
Timor Tengah, North Timor Tengah and Belu," said the head of the
Kupang office of the Meteorology and Geophysics Agency (BMG),
Rivai Marulak.
"The epicenter was at a depth of 38.5 kilometers below the
surface of the sea," he added.
Hundreds of officials from the East Nusa Tenggara
administration fled out of their office buildings after they felt
the quake.
"We were really afraid and tried to save ourselves as glass
the windows and the buildings suddenly started shaking," said Adi
Tiran, a protocol officer working in the province's gubernatorial
office in Kupang.
The quake was followed by an earthquake measuring 5.5 on the
Richter scale which took place at around 10:15 a.m. in the Flores
Sea, panicking thousands of people.
"The quake in the Flores Sea was an aftershock and was only
felt by residents in Alor regency and the southern part of
Flores," Rivai said.
Residents said they were terrified as they feared that Flores
was going to be hit by a devastating quake like the one that
occurred in 1991, which killed some 50 people and destroyed or
damaged hundreds of buildings.
"We were scared about the possibility of another quake,
perhaps even more powerful," said Lorens Pandu, a resident of
Kalabahi village, Alor regency.
On Saturday, a quake measuring 5.5 on the Richter scale also
jolted Alor and several parts of Southeast Maluku regency, Maluku
province.
Alor Regent Ans Takalapeta said on Monday that there were no
reports of structural damage or injuries as the epicenter was far
beneath the sea bed.
On Sunday, an earthquake measuring 5.2 on the Richter scale
jolted Lampung at about 9.57 p.m., Yusuf, an official with the
BMG Jakarta office was quoted by DPA as saying.
He said the quake's epicenter was in the Indian Ocean, about
151 kilometers southwest Kotabumi town, at about 105 kilometers
beneath the sea bed.
Antara reported the quake also shook Bengkulu, sending
residents running out of their homes in panic.
On June 2000, a powerful earthquake measuring 7.3 on the
Richter scale struck Bengkulu, killing at least 94 people and
heavily damaging thousands of houses.
Indonesia is located in the Pacific volcanic belt known as the
"Ring of Fire", where earthquakes and volcanoes are commonplace.