An earthquake with a magnitude of 7.7 struck off the coast of Indonesia's Flores Island on Saturday morning, killing at least 51 people, injuring more than 100 and displacing about 5,000, as rescue teams worked through landslides to reach villages closest to the epicenter.
The temblor, which hit at 5:58 a.m. local time about 42 miles north-northwest of the city of Ende in East Nusa Tenggara province, is one of Indonesia's deadliest quakes in years. It cut off access to the hardest-hit regencies of Manggarai, East Manggarai and Nagekeo, prompted officials to weigh a provincial state of emergency, and triggered a tsunami warning that was later lifted.
The response
Cabinet Secretary Teddy Indra Wijaya said more than 3,500 military and police personnel had been deployed. Lt. Gen. Suharyanto, head of Indonesia's disaster mitigation agency BNPB, said three helicopters and a rescue vessel had been sent to a region whose scattered small islands make access difficult. State energy firm Pertamina said 20 petrol stations remained shut because of power outages.
Deputy Health Minister Benjamin Paulus Octavianus told a televised meeting on Sunday that 36 people were seriously injured and 77 more sustained minor injuries. The National Search and Rescue Agency later put the injury count at 101, with more than 900 homes destroyed and 450 damaged, NPR reported.
On the ground
Landslides blocked sections of the Trans-Flores Highway, the 435-mile road that links communities across the mountainous island. Thousands in Labuan Bajo, the gateway to Komodo National Park, spent the night outdoors, NPR said.
"We have cleared most landslides and reopened roads to previously isolated villages, although communication disruptions and power outages continue to hamper search efforts," said Fathur Rahman, head of the Search and Rescue Office in Maumere.
Nona, a 51-year-old resident of Talibura village, described the pre-dawn shock to Reuters. "The quake was massive, the shock was so strong," she said. "There were 13 of us inside the house, and we all ran to save ourselves."
What remains unclear
Indonesian government agencies are the primary factual authorities cited, and figures diverged across the outlets: Al Jazeera cited 341 aftershocks and at least 157 destroyed houses drawn from BNPB, while NPR, citing Indonesia's meteorological agency and the National Search and Rescue Agency, counted 235 aftershocks and more than 900 homes destroyed by Sunday.
Aftershocks were expected to continue for several days, and officials were still weighing a state of emergency that would unlock further funding. The same stretch of Flores coastline was struck by a magnitude-7 earthquake in December 1992 that killed about 2,500 people.