A magnitude 5.4 earthquake struck Cianjur, in Indonesia’s West Java province, killing at least 44 and injuring 300, in addition to significant damage to homes and infrastructure, according to a local official.
“Dozens of people have been killed. Hundreds, maybe even thousands of houses have been damaged. So far 44 people have died,” Adam, spokesman for the local government in Cianjur town, West Java, told AFP.
Prior to this information, the head of Cianjur Municipal Administration had put forward the existence of 20 deaths.
“According to the information I have at the moment, almost 20 people have died and at least 300 are being treated. Most of them have broken bones after being trapped in the rubble of buildings,” says Herman Suherman, head of the town council of Cianjur. to the Metro TV channel.
The province of West Java is the most populous province of Indonesia with almost 50 million inhabitants.
BREAK: #BNNIndonesia reports
According to local officials, “nearly 20 people were killed and 300 injured”. #Indonesias #West Java magnitude 5.6 #earthquake🇧🇷 pic.twitter.com/jFlNLVssVb
– Gurbaksh Singh Chahal (@gchahal) November 21, 2022
The United States Geological Survey (USGS), which tracks seismic activity around the world, recorded the earthquake at 1:21 p.m. (6:21 a.m. in Lisbon), placing the epicenter at 10.2 miles (16.7 kilometers) from the city of Cianjur, which has a population of about 170,000 people.
In other videos circulating the internet, it is possible to see people on stretchers in a hospital in the region and several others receiving medical attention.
#Indonesia ❗️The village of Mangunkerta west of #Cianjur also suffered structural collapses and severe damage in the West Java region after the 5.6 Mw earthquake.
Other small towns near the epicenter could be in similar conditions. pic.twitter.com/DfPwJ8kSSJ
– EarthquakesTime (@EarthQuakesTime) November 21, 2022
The quake also caused damage to several homes and infrastructure around Cianjur, which is about 75 kilometers from Jakarta, where residents also felt the tremors, according to reports from users on the networks.
For its part, Indonesia’s Bureau of Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics (BMKG) estimated the magnitude of the earthquake at 5.6 and ruled out a “potential ‘tsunami’ hazard”.
On Friday, a magnitude 6.9 earthquake shook the west coast of Indonesia and its epicenter was near the small island of Enggano.
Indonesia, with a population of about 275 million, lies on the so-called Pacific Ring of Fire, an area of great seismic and volcanic activity in which about 7,000 earthquakes are recorded annually, most of them moderate.
Source: DN
