Six killed by tsunami after quake
A powerful earthquake sent a two-metre high tsunami crashing into a beach resort on Indonesia's Java island today, killing at least six people and causing extensive damage to hotels, restaurants and homes, police and witnesses said.
Thousands of people along the coast fled to higher ground, some climbing trees or crowding into mosques inland to pray.
"All the houses are destroyed along the beach," Teti, a woman at Pangandaran beach in west Java, told el-Shinta radio station. "Small hotels are completely destroyed and at least one restaurant was washed away."
President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono told reporters that at least five people were killed, but Agus, a local police spokesman, said he saw six corpses.
Roads were blocked and power cut along much of beach, hampering efforts to get to victims, he said.
The tsunami followed a 7.2-magnitude quake that struck deep beneath the Indian Ocean 150 miles south-west of Java's western coast at 3.24pm (9.24am Irish time), causing tall buildings to sway as far off as the capital Jakarta.
It was followed by a 6.1-magnitude aftershock two hours later.
Transport Minister Hatta Radjasa said he had heard reports about a tsunami striking two seaside towns, and urged people living on Java's southern coast to move inland in an orderly fashion.
"Everyone should move from the beach," he told el-Shinta.
Japan's Meteorological Agency said almost immediately after the quake that it had the potential to trigger a destructive tsunami on coastlines along Indonesia's Java, Sumatra and Lesser Sunda islands.
Australia's Cocos and Christmas islands were also seen as at risk, but tourism officials there said nearly an hour after the quake that they had not felt anything and were unaware of a tsunami.
"I think we're OK," said Asma Jim of the Cocos Island Tourism Association. "It's a very small island, and I didn't even know there had been a quake."
Indonesia is prone to earthquakes because of its location on the so-called Pacific "Ring of Fire," an arc of volcanoes and fault lines encircling the Pacific Basin.
A massive 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami killed at least 216,000 people - nearly half of them in Indonesia's Aceh province.
On May 27, a magnitude-5.9 earthquake devastated a large swath of Java Island, killing more than 5,800 people.
