Quake kills 162, mostly children

JAKARTA: The death toll from the shallow 5.6-magnitude earthquake that hit Indonesia has risen to at least 162, with hundreds injured and others still missing.

Most of the fatalities were children who had finished school but were staying behind for extra lessons when the quake hit the western region of the main island of Java on Monday, West Java governor Ridwan Kamil said.

“I regret to inform that 162 are dead and 326 are injured, with most of them sustaining fractures from being crushed in ruins,” Mr Kamil told a press conference.

Indonesia’s national disaster mitigation agency, BNPB, said 25 people were trapped under the rubble of collapsed buildings.

The agency said more than 2000 houses were damaged and Mr Kamil said more than 13,000 people were taken to evacuation centres.

Mr Kamil said power had been partially restored by the evening, without specifying if that meant by generators or connection to a power grid.

The afternoon quake was centred in the Cianjur region and local authorities earlier said as many as 700 had been wounded, warning the death toll could rise further.

Agus Azhari, 19, was with his elderly mother in the family home when their living room was destroyed within seconds, parts of the walls and roof collapsing around them.

“I pulled my mother’s hand, and we ran outside,” he said. “I heard people screaming for help from all around me.”

Indonesia’s meteorological agency said it recorded 62 aftershocks in Cianjur after the quake, with magnitudes ranging from 1.8 to 4.

The quake was followed by a strong 7.0 magnitude earthquake in Solomon Islands, where witnesses reported violent shaking that hurled televisions and other items to the ground.

A tsunami warning was issued for an area of the Solomons coast within 300km of the epicentre.

“This was a big one,” Joy Nisha, a receptionist with the Heritage Park Hotel in the capital Honiara, said.

“Some of the things in the hotel fell. Everyone seems OK, but panicky.”