A magnitude 7.7 earthquake struck off Flores in eastern Indonesia at 5:58am local time on Saturday, with an epicentre about 68 kilometres north-northwest of the city of Ende and a depth of 10 kilometres [1]. A shallow quake of that size near inhabited land is a mass-casualty event, and the counting has not settled.
Two officials gave two different death tolls, and we print them side by side rather than reconcile them. The head of the National Disaster Management Agency, Suharyanto, said 38 people had been confirmed killed in the initial quake [1]. A rescue official, Fathur Rahman, put the death toll at 40 and the number of injured at 50 [1]. Those figures come from different vantage points inside the response, which is why a single 'official toll' does not yet exist.
The dead were concentrated in three regencies: Sikka, Manggarai and East Manggarai [1]. About 2,000 villagers in Nagekeo regency fled their homes to temporary shelters [1]. The strongest aftershock measured magnitude 6.1, and a separate magnitude 6.9 quake struck Sumatra island with no initial reports of damage [1]. Officials issued a tsunami warning and then lifted it after urging residents to move to higher ground [1].
Nona, a 51-year-old resident, described the moment plainly: the quake was massive, the shock was so strong, we were resting at home [1]. The region has cause to move fast. A December 1992 earthquake in the same area, and the tsunami it triggered, killed more than 2,500 people on Flores [1], and that memory is part of why shelters filled and the coast was cleared within hours.
