Magnitude-6.2 quake hits Indonesia’s Sumatra, 2 dead
Bangkok, Feb 25 (EFE).- At least two people lost their lives, and 20 suffered injuries after a magnitude-6.2 earthquake hit the Indonesian island of Sumatra on Friday, officials said.
The Indonesian National Board for Disaster Management said the fatalities occurred in West Pasaman on the west coast of Sumatra, one of the most populated in the archipelago.
The earthquake, causing tremors in neighboring Singapore, forced the temporary evacuation of schools and residential buildings.
Videos posted by witnesses on social networks showed people fleeing their buildings.
The United States Geological Survey, which records global seismic activity, said the epicenter lay at a depth of 12 km in the central region of the island and 66.8 km northwest of the town of Bukittinggi, home to some 120,000 people.
The Indonesian authorities warned of possible strong aftershocks but ruled out the possibility of a tsunami.
Witnesses already reported minor tremors of 4.8 and 4.7 magnitudes.
Indonesia sits on the Pacific Ring of Fire, an area of great seismic and volcanic activity.
About 7,000 earthquakes hit the archipelago each year, most of them moderate.
On Dec.14, the Indonesian authorities issued tsunami warnings after a magnitude-7.3 earthquake struck off the island of Flores, East Nusa Tenggara province.
In August 2018, a magnitude-6.9 earthquake struck northern Lombok island in West Nusa Tenggara, killing around 560 people and injuring more than 1,000.
Some 4,340 people died, and more than 10,000 suffered injuries in a shallow magnitude-7.5 earthquake that caused a tsunami and liquefaction in northwest Sulawesi in September that year.
Three months later, in December 2018, a tsunami left more than 430 people dead and 14,000 injured in the coastal areas of the islands of Java and Sumatra when part of the Anak Krakatao volcano collapsed during an eruption.
In 2004, a strong earthquake in Sumatra generated a tsunami that caused more than 226,000 deaths in a dozen nations washed by the Indian Ocean. EFE
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