Strong quake shakes Indonesia’s capital; no tsunami alert

JAKARTA, Indonesia: A robust earthquake shook components of Indonesia’s important island of Java on Friday, damaging buildings and homes and sending individuals into the streets, however no casualties had been reported. Officers mentioned there was no hazard of a tsunami.
The US Geological Survey mentioned the magnitude 6.6 quake was situated within the Indian Ocean about 88 kilometers (54 miles) southwest of Labuan, a coastal city in Banten province. It was centered at a depth of 37 kilometers (23 miles), it mentioned.
Dwikorita Karnawati, head of Indonesia’s Meteorology, Climatology, and Geophysical Company, mentioned there was no hazard of a tsunami however warned of doable aftershocks.
Excessive-rises in Jakarta, the capital, swayed for greater than 10 seconds and a few ordered evacuations, sending streams of individuals into the streets. Even two-story houses shook strongly within the satellite tv for pc cities of Tangerang, Bogor and Bekasi.
Earthquakes happen ceaselessly throughout the sprawling archipelago nation, however it’s unusual for them to be felt in Jakarta.
“The tremor was horrible … all the pieces in my room was swinging,” mentioned Laila Anjasari, a Jakarta resident who lives on the nineteenth flooring of an house constructing, “We ran out and down the steps in panic.”
At the least 257 homes and buildings had been broken, largely in Pandeglang, the closest district to the epicenter, mentioned Nationwide Catastrophe Mitigation Company spokesperson Abdul Muhari. Minor injury was additionally reported elsewhere, however there have been no experiences of accidents.
Indonesia is susceptible to seismic upheaval as a result of its location on main geological faults often called the Pacific “Ring of Fireplace.”
In January final yr, a magnitude 6.2 earthquake killed a minimum of 105 individuals and injured almost 6,500 in West Sulawesi province.
In 2004, a particularly highly effective Indian Ocean quake set off a tsunami that killed greater than 230,000 individuals in a dozen nations, most of them in Indonesia’s Aceh province.