Great Earthquakes In Diverse Places
Strong Earthquake strikes eastern Indonesia: USGS
(AFP)
JAKARTA — A strong, 6.0-magnitude earthquake struck Sunday off
Indonesia's eastern Aru Islands, the US Geological Survey said. There
was no immediate warning of a tsuanmi.
The quake struck at 9:12 pm (1212 GMT) at a depth of 8.7 kilometres
(5.4 miles) and 63 kilometres (39 miles) northwest of Dobo, in the Aru
Islands, and 664 kilometres east-southeast of Ambon in the Moluccas,
the USGS said.
Suharjono, the technical head of the Indonesia Agency for Meteorology,
Climatology and Geophysics, told AFP that no reports of casualties or
damage has been received yet from the remote region.
"The reason could be that there is no significant effect from the
quake, but there are many islands in the region and quakes are common
there," said Suharjono, who like many Indonesians goes by only one name.
"We will continue to monitor" for quake damage, he said, adding that
there was no tsunami potential despite the quake occurring offshore.
Indonesia sits on the Pacific "ring of fire", where the meeting of
continental plates causes high volcanic and seismic activity, and the
archipelago is frequently struck by powerful earthquakes.