A totally different scenario at epicentre of earthquake

LENDE TOVEA: The lives of many villagers living at the epicentre of a devastating earthquake that struck Sulawesi island and killed more than 1,600 people were spared because they had been terrified by a smaller one that hit three hours earlier.

A coastal strip dotted with villages north of the devastated city of Palu was cut off for nearly a week by landslides blocking its single road link after the major 7.5 magnitude quake struck late in the afternoon on Sept 28.

While destruction is extensive, with many houses destroyed, villagers said yesterday countless lives were saved by a 6.1 magnitude quake that struck about three hours earlier.

“Luckily most people were already outside,” said Rahman Lakuaci, chief of the village here in Sirenja district.

Authorities have yet to conduct a tally of casualties in Sirenja and the other districts near the epicentre north of Palu, but Lakuaci estimated dozens of people had been killed in the area.

The city of Palu, on the other hand, 78km away, suffered heavy casualties. Soil liquefaction, a phenomenon that turns the ground into a roiling quagmire, also killed many hundreds of people in and around Palu.

But that did not happen near the epicentre of the quake and, even though many villagers ran up into the hills rising to the east of the coastline, tsunami waves did not crash into the small fishing communities.

The area saw no looting after the quake, unlike in Palu, largely because there are no warehouses and leaders had mobilised volunteers to maintain order.