A powerful earthquake shook parts of Indonesia’s main island of Java on Friday, damaging buildings and houses and sending people into the streets, but no casualties were reported.
Officials said there was no danger of a tsunami.
The US Geological Survey said the epicenter of the magnitude 6.6 earthquake was in the Indian Ocean about 88km southwest of Labuan, a coastal town in Banten Province.
Photo: Reuters
Its hypocenter was at a depth of 37km, it said.
Indonesian Agency for Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics Director Dwikorita Karnawati said there was no danger of a tsunami, but warned of possible aftershocks.
High-rises in Jakarta swayed for more than 10 seconds and some ordered evacuations, sending streams of people into the streets. Even two-story homes shook strongly in the satellite cities of Tangerang, Bogor and Bekasi.
Earthquakes occur frequently across the sprawling island nation, but it is uncommon for them to be felt in the capital.
“The tremor was horrible ... everything in my room was swinging,” said Laila Anjasari, a Jakarta resident who lives on the 19th floor of an apartment building, “We ran out and down the stairs in panic.”
At least 257 houses and buildings were damaged, mostly in Pandeglang, the closest district to the epicenter, Indonesian National Disaster Mitigation Agency spokesman Abdul Muhari said.
Minor damage was also reported elsewhere, but there were no reports of injuries.
Indonesia is prone to seismic upheaval due to its location on major geological faults known as the Pacific “Ring of Fire.”
In January last year, a magnitude 6.2 earthquake killed at least 105 people and injured nearly 6,500 in West Sulawesi Province.
In 2004, an extremely powerful Indian Ocean quake set off a tsunami that killed more than 230,000 people in a dozen countries, most of them in Indonesia’s Aceh Province.
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