Strong quake kills 14, injures 162 in Indonesia

JAKARTA, Indonesia—A strong and shallow earthquake early Sunday killed at least 14 people and injured more than 160 on Indonesia's Lombok island, a popular tourist destination next to Bali, officials said.

The quake damaged more than 1,000 houses and was felt in a wider area, including on Bali, where no damage or casualties were reported.

The U.S. Geological Survey said the quake struck at a depth of only 7 kilometers (4.4 miles). Shallow earthquakes tend to do more damage than deeper ones.

East Lombok district was the hardest hit with 10 deaths, including a Malaysian tourist, said Sutopo Purwo Nugroho, a spokesman for Indonesia's Disaster Mitigation Agency. The number of casualties could increase as data was still being collected from other locations on the island, he said.

The quake caused blackouts in East Lombok and North Lombok districts and triggered a large landslide from Mount Rinjani, an active volcano. Rescuers were evacuating more than 800 tourists from the mountain.

Indonesia is prone to earthquakes due to its location on the Pacific "Ring of Fire," an arc of volcanoes and fault lines in the Pacific Basin. In December 2004, a massive magnitude 9.1 earthquake off Sumatra triggered a tsunami that killed 230,000 people in a dozen countries.