A powerful earthquake rattled southern Indonesia yesterday, killing at least 15 people crushed by falling rock or collapsed buildings and sending thousands fleeing outdoors for safety in the middle of the work day.
Hospitals quickly filled with scores of injured people after the magnitude 7.0 quake struck off the southern coast of the main island of Java, where most of Indonesia’s 235 million people live. The death toll was expected to rise.
“The earthquake was shaking everything in my house very strongly for almost a minute,” said Heni Maryani, a resident in the town of Sukabumi. “I grabbed my children and ran out, I saw people were in panic, women were screaming and children were crying.”
Disaster officials said homes and buildings had collapsed in three districts in densely populated West Java. About 30 people were trapped under rocks and dirt in one village, the official Antara news agency reported.
A tsunami warning was issued after the quake struck at 2:55pm, but revoked an hour later.
Muharaham Ardan, a university lecturer in the town of Tasikmalaya, about 115km from the epicenter, said it was the biggest quake he had ever felt.
Priyadi Kardono, a spokesman for the Disaster Management Agency, reported 15 deaths in the districts of Cianjur, Tasikmalaya and Sukabumi in West Java.
Antara reported that 12 families, or about 30 people, were trapped in houses buried by a landslide in Rawa Hideung village. Six bodies had been recovered and the fate of many others was unknown, a resident, Agus Sobandi, said.
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