Indonesian 8.7 quake--officials say no tsunami

[Lone Pawn]

BANDA ACEH, Indonesia (AP) - A major earthquake struck off the west coast of Indonesia late Monday, sending residents in several countries fleeing in panic in fear that it would cause the region's second tsunami disaster within four months.

But fears of another catastrophe eased within hours, as officials in countries closest to the quake's epicenter said they had received no reports of waves striking their coasts three hours after the earthquake hit.

"It seems this earthquake did not trigger a tsunami,'' said Prihar Yadi, a scientist with the Indonesia Geophysics Agency. "If it had, the tsunami would have hit the coastline of Sumatra by now. And if there's no tsunami on the coastline near the epicenter of the quake, there will not be one heading in the other direction.

http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2005/3/29/latest/20050329033415&sec=Latest

[Lone Pawn]

1. Self-kick.

Couple threads sounding alarms, just want to let people know they don't need to be too worried.

[Ediacara]

2. I am a little skeptical...

....but releived. How good are communications between these washed out (and mostly empty) coastal towns and Jakarta? Do Banda Aceh and other towns have any phone service right now?

ON EDIT: I really feel I must up my skepticism since my initial post. Earthquakes knock out phone service generally, so any phone service that may have been present is probably gone. Also, this quake was in the middle of the night, so hopefully most people ran up hill. If everyone ran up hill (in the middle of the night without electricity), it's unlikely that they'd be able to see, or even hear, a tsunami, if one were to come.

[Lone Pawn]

5. Might help.

http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2005/3/29/latest/20050329035822&sec=Latest

"The hard-hit population of western Sumatra have been again struck by a very large earthquake,'' Egeland said. "We do not have reports of any tsunami yet and we have also only limited reports of damage.''

He said there were "unconfirmed reports'' of deaths on Nias, a renowned surfing spot badly hit by the earlier quake.

"What may have happened in Nias, where there are reports of deaths caused by this earthquake, may be that buildings that nearly collaspsed during the first earthquake collapsed now,'' Egeland said. Egeland said there were thousands of relief officials in the region, and they were ready to respond if reports of casualties and damage are confirmed. - AP

[alwynsw]

6. The newsies are still in Banda Aceh, Phuket and other areas hit by

the 12/26 tsunami. Even though it was roughly 1:00 A.M. there, the street were flooded (pardon the pun) with what appeared to be very heavy, yet orderly traffic, both motorized and pedestrian, headed for higher ground.

i flipped around Bloomberg, CNN, and Faux and got essentially the same feeds on all three.

[Willy Lee]

3. What a relief.

[whistle]

4. That's the third big one for that region since the tsunami isn't it?

[demnan]

7. What a relief they didn't get a catastrophe like the last time

n/t

[smitty]

8. earthquake

Could Toba on the island of Sumatra be getting ready to erupt again? It last blew about 75,000 years ago---a genuine "super volcano", very dangerous.

http://volcano.und.nodak.edu/vwdocs/volc_images/southeast_asia/indonesia/toba.html