A powerful earthquake measuring 8,2 struck Indonesia’s Sumatra region on Wednesday, followed by a 6,6-magnitude later in the day, triggering tsunami warnings in the Indian Ocean and sparking panic in coastal areas across South-East Asia and at least one death.
About two-and-a-half hours after the quake hit, Indonesia’s meteorological agency lifted its tsunami warning and said there had been no tsunami, although an official at the agency later said that gauges had measured a wave surge of 1m.
Malaysian authorities reported a tsunami measuring 1m to 3m in height and heading away from the epicentre of the quake.
However, Indonesia issued a new tsunami warning after a fresh quake measuring 6,6 on the Richter scale hit south Sumatra island later on Wednesday. The country’s metereological agency said via SMS that the quake, which followed the more powerful quake hours earlier, struck 76km north-west of Lais Bengkulu in south Sumatra at a depth of 18km.
Indonesian presidential spokesperson Andi Mallarangeng said that one person had died after being hit by debris in Bengkulu, a town in south Sumatra close to the quake. ”The emergency rescue system has mobilised and the president has ordered the military to help the rescue effort,” he added.
Some buildings in Padang, the capital of West Sumatra had collapsed, witnesses reported, while Metro TV said some buildings had caught fire.
A Reuters witness said residents of Padang fled for higher ground. ”The city is in complete chaos. Everyone is heading to higher ground, I saw one house collapsed to the ground. I’m trying to save my family,” said the witness in Padang, the provincial capital of West Sumatra, north of the tremor’s epicentre.
Indonesia’s meteorological agency said via an SMS alert the first quake’s epicentre was 159km south-west of Bengkulu, a remote area of mountains and forests.
The Pacific Tsunami Warning Centre had issued an Indian Ocean tsunami warning after the huge quake struck at 11.10am GMT. Authorities from Malaysia and Sri Lanka issued independent warnings, as did India for the Andaman and Nicobar islands, and Australia for Christmas and Cocos islands.
A huge earthquake struck the same area on December 26 2004, causing a massive tsunami and more than 230 000 deaths in countries across the region. Indonesia suffers frequent quakes, lying on an active seismic belt on part of the so-called Pacific ”Ring of Fire”.
Some residents of Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand also felt the quake and some buildings were evacuated.
Budi, a police chief in Bengkulu, said on Indonesia’s Elshinta radio that he felt a strong quake. ”People panicked and tried to save themselves,” he said. He added he heard a report that a three-storey building had collapsed.
Direction unclear
In Malaysia, Mohd Rosaidi Cheabas, director of the Meteorology Department’s seismological division, said the country was not following Indonesia, which had lifted an earlier tsunami warning for the neighbouring country.
”Right now, the tsunami is already detected over Padang, Indonesia, at a height of 1m to 3m,” he said. ”We are not following Indonesia. We are still monitoring the movement of the tsunami wave to our region.”
Suhardjono, an official at Indonesia’s meteorological agency, said that there had been higher waves in Padang but they were not destructive. ”A quake of this magnitude will result in tidal waves, but these waves were not destructive. Tide gauges recorded 1m-high waves in Padang,” he said.
Cheabas said the tsunami had been detected by a tidal gauge and was not clear on the direction of the wave. The division estimated that if the tsunami was headed for Malaysia, it could reach the north-western shores of the Malaysian peninsula after 2pm GMT.
Malaysian authorities issued a tsunami warning for citizens to stay away from beaches.
Police on the resort island of Penang, hit in the 2004 tsunami, were mobilised to evacuate people from beach-side hotels and other dwellings, a local government official said.
Australia widened its tsunami warning late on Wednesday to cover the nation’s west coast, as well as its Indian Ocean territories of Christmas Island and Cocos Island.
Australia’s Bureau of Meteorology said there may be some effects on the north-west coast of Western Australia, extending down to Broome and eventually further south to the state capital, Perth, by about midnight local time.
Seismologist Phil Cummins from Geoscience Australia told local news agency AAP that a small tsunami had been observed in Indonesia itself and a 15cm tsunami observed on the tidal gauge at Cocos Island. — Reuters
Additional reporting Harry Suhartono, Mita Valina Liem, Ed Davies