Indonesian Quakes Trigger Tsunami Alerts

By ANTHONY DEUTSCH

PADANG, Indonesia – Three powerful earthquakes jolted Indonesia in less than 24 hours, triggering tsunami alerts Thursday and sending panicked residents fleeing to high ground. At least nine people were killed in the tremors.

The first two quakes in western Indonesia – magnitudes 8.4 and 7.8 – were followed by a 6.2-magnitude temblor in the east, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.

The largest spawned nearly 10-foot-high waves on Sumatra island Wednesday, and the other two on Thursday triggered tsunami alerts, Indonesia’s meteorological agency said.

Indonesia, the world’s largest archipelago, is prone to seismic upheaval due to its location on the so-called Pacific "Ring of Fire," an arc of volcanos and fault lines encircling the Pacific Basin.

In December 2004, a massive earthquake struck off Sumatra island and triggered a tsunami that killed more than 230,000 people in a dozen countries, including 160,000 people in Indonesia’s westernmost province of Aceh.