Two dead after magnitude 7.7 earthquake strikes off Indonesia

By Dewi Kurniawati

JAKARTA, Aug 15 (Reuters) – At least two people died after an earthquake of magnitude 7.7 and dozens of aftershocks struck off eastern Indonesia early on Saturday, the authorities said.

Tsunami waves of less than 1 metre (3 feet) were recorded in several areas of the Southeast Asian nation. The tsunami warning was lifted about three hours after the quake.

In addition to the deaths of at least two, one person was injured in Sikka Regency, the disaster mitigation agency BNPB said in a statement.

Parts of a building collapsed into dust and rubble as people screamed and ran in the street, a video on Facebook, verified by Reuters as being at a port in Maumere, showed. It is the main town in Sikka Regency on Flores Island in the east of Indonesia’s vast archipelago.

Strong shaking was felt across East Nusa Tenggara, West Nusa Tenggara and parts of South Sulawesi, and residents in several areas reported shaking lasting about one minute, BNPB said.

“Most of the people felt the shock and scattered out of their homes,” it said.

A hospital in the district of Ende in East Nusa Tenggara Province was moving patients outside, Kompas TV footage showed, and Kompas.com reported at least one landslide.

Geophysics agency BMKG recorded the first quake at 4:58 a.m. (2158 GMT) at a depth of 15 km (9 miles), followed by several aftershocks.

Australia’s tsunami warning centre said the undersea earthquake would have “no tsunami threat to the Australian mainland, islands or territories”.

(Reporting by Dewi Kurniawati, Bernadette Christina, Fransiska Nangoy and Steffano Sulaiman in Jakarta; Assitional reporting by Carlos Méndez and Mrinmay Dey in Mexico City, Writing by Josh Smith; Editing by Mark Porter, Lisa Shumaker and William Mallard)