By IINA,
Jakarta : A magnitude-6.6 undersea earthquake shook parts of eastern Indonesia today, injuring at least three people and heavily damaging hundreds of buildings, officials said. The quake struck at 5.41am and was centered 51 kilometers north-east of Sumbawa Island, the Meteorological and Geophysical Agency in Jakarta said. The quake struck 10 kilometers below the seabed but triggered no tsunami, officials said in reporting the latest of a series of earthquakes to strike Indonesia in recent days. A series of aftershocks followed with the latest, measuring 5.2 on the Richter scale, coming four hours after the initial quake.
The U.S. Geological Survey put the quake’s magnitude at 5.7, while Indonesia’s meteorology and geophysics agency said it was 6.6 on the Richter scale. The epicenter of the quake was 51 km northeast of Sumbawa island at a depth of 10 km, according to an official at the Indonesian agency. There were at two aftershocks reported in the area later on Thursday. Slamet Wijoyo, an official at the Indonesian meteorology agency, said 200 houses were severely damaged in a village in the Pekat area on Sumbawa about 40 km from the epicenter.
Another official at Indonesia’s disaster management center said 75 houses were damaged in the Sanggar area in Dompu regency. No casualties were reported. Indonesia suffers frequent earthquakes lying in an area of intense seismic activity where several tectonic plates collide.