DJAKARTA (Reuters) - A powerful earthquake off the southwest of Java Island left at least six people dead and resulted in the evacuation of 5.000 people on Wednesday, reports the Indonesian disaster management agency.
The earthquake triggered a tsunami warning, but it was lifted soon after.
Damage has been reported in West Java, in Tasikmalaya, not far from the epicenter of the earthquake, and in Bandung, a large city with several universities.
The health ministry announced the dispatch of medical teams to Tasikmalaya, where several buildings collapsed according to witnesses, including the mayor's residence. A mosque was also damaged.
Other buildings were damaged in Bandung.
Java, a highly populated island in the Indonesian archipelago, with more than 110 million inhabitants, also has the capital Jakarta, where buildings have been shaken and where employees have evacuated offices by the thousands.
"The building vibrated first for about ten seconds, then it stopped, and then it resumed," said a Reuters correspondent in the capital.
The earthquake was felt as far as Surabaya, the second largest city in Indonesia, 500 km east of Tasikmalaya.
EPICENTER AT SEA
The Indonesian Seismology Institute said the earthquake was 7,3 magnitude and its epicenter was at sea, 142 km southwest of Tasikmalaya.
The American Geological Institute first reported a slightly higher magnitude, 7,4, before lowering it to 7,0. It also located its hypocentre about 50 km deep.
The Hawaii-based Pacific Tsunami Warning Center said there was no risk of a major tidal wave in South Asia after the earthquake. But for its part, the Japanese Meteorological Agency had spoken of a risk of a destructive local tsunami, which could affect the coasts located up to 100 km from the epicenter.
Tidal wave alerts were triggered on the coasts of Java, within a radius of a few hundred kilometers around the epicenter, but they were lifted half an hour later.
Indonesian power company PLN said the earthquake did not cause a power outage.
The hydrocarbon company Pertamina specified that its Balongan refinery, with a capacity of 125.000 barrels per day (bpd) in west Java, and that of Cilacap (348.000 bpd), in the center of the island, had not been affected by the shock.
With the Djakarta office, French version Eric Faye and Clément Dossin
the world news source