Injured victims rest at a makeshift hospital in Pemenang, North Lombok on August 6, 2018, the day after a 6.9 magnitude earthquake struck the area. AFP / Pikong
Jakarta: The death toll from the devastating 6.9-magnitude earthquake that struck the Indonesian tourist island of Lombok on Sunday night has risen to at least 98, Indonesia's National Disaster Mitigation Agency said Monday.
At least 236 others were injured, while thousands of houses were destroyed in the quake that was centered on the island's northern coast at a depth of 31 kilometers, according to the agency.
The majority of fatalities occurred in the worst-affected North Lombok Regency, with many victims dying after becoming buried under debris from collapsed homes, agency spokesman Sutopo Purwo Nugroho said.
"The number of fatalities, however, will certainly increase because there are still victims buried under the debris of a collapsed mosque and have not been evacuated in the village of Lading-Lading in North Lombok Regency," Sutopo said.
The Meteorological, Climatological and Geophysics Agency said small tsunamis measuring 10 and 13 centimeters in height were detected in the villages of Carik, Badas, Lembar and Beno on Lombok and its surrounding islands. It later lifted a tsunami warning issued soon after the quake.
The agency also said 132 aftershocks had been recorded.
The quake was centered 48 km northeast of Mataram, the island's largest city, 1,390 km east of Jakarta, according to the US Geological Survey. The quake was also strongly felt in Bali, a resort island just next to Lombok, as well as the eastern part of Java.
Sutopo said about 900 foreign and local tourists were being evacuated from three of the Gili Islands off Lombok by rubber dinghy before being transferred to six ships.
A video footage taken by a volunteer at the agency showed tourists, fearing a tsunami, packing the beaches of two of those islands popular with divers to evacuate by boat.
According to Sutopo, about 10,000 people displaced by that quake remain in temporary shelters, and the latest temblor may increase the number of the displaced "because the areas affected by the Auguat 5 quake are larger than those by the July 29 one".
Sunday's quake occurred just a week after an earthquake with a magnitude of 6.4 struck Lombok, killing 17 people and injuring many others.
Indonesia sits on the Pacific Ring of Fire and is regularly hit by earthquakes. In 2004, the Indian Ocean tsunami killed 226,000 people in 13 countries, including more than 120,000 in Indonesia. (QNA)
