Big Quake Strikes Off Coast of Indonesia, Tsunami Warning in 28 Countries

[gatagato]

Epicenter of earthquake off the coast of northern Sumatra

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Event Time
2012-04-11 08:38:37 UTC
2012-04-11 14:38:37 UTC+06:00 at epicenter
2012-04-11 10:38:37 UTC+02:00 system time
Nearby Cities
369km (229mi) W from Sinabang, Indonesia
395km (245mi) WSW from Meulaboh, Indonesia
437km (271mi) SW from Banda Aceh, Indonesia
468km (290mi) SSW from Sabang, Indonesia
963km (598mi) W from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

The quake triggered a tsunami watch alert across the Indian Ocean region.

The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center (PTWC) said it was not yet known whether a tsunami had been generated, but advised authorities to "take appropriate action".

The region is regularly hit by earthquakes. The Indian Ocean tsunami of 2004 killed 170,000 people in Aceh.

The US Geological Survey (USGS), which documents quakes worldwide, said the Aceh quake was centred 33km (20 miles) under the sea about 495km from Banda Aceh, the provincial capital.

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Sirens and Koran recitals from mosques are everywhere”
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Sutopo

Indonesian emergency official
It was initially reported as 8.9 magnitude but was later revised down to 8.7 by the USGS. Strong aftershocks were also reported.

The PTWC alert said quakes of such a magnitude "have the potential to generate a widespread destructive tsunami that can affect coastlines across the entire Indian Ocean basin".

But Bruce Presgrave of the USGS later told the BBC that the nature of this quake made it less likely a tsunami would be generated, as the earth had moved horizontally, rather than vertically, therefore had not displaced large volumes of water.

"We can't rule out the possibility, but horizontal motion is less likely to produce a destructive tsunami," he said.

Sutopo, a spokesman for Indonesia's disaster mitigation agency, said the quake had been felt "very strongly".

"Electricity is down, there's traffic jams to access higher ground. Sirens and Koran recitals from mosques are everywhere," he told Reuters.

'Minute of chaos'

The earthquake monitoring agency in Indonesia said the tsunami warning would remain in place for another few hours, but that there had been no reports so far of a low tide, which would indicate the water was receding before building into a tsunami.

The tremor was felt as far away as Singapore, Thailand, Sri Lanka and India.

"There was a tremor felt by all of us working in the building," a man called Vincent in Calcutta, India, told the BBC.

"All just ran out of the building and people were asked not to use the elevator. There was a minute of chaos where all started ringing up to their family and asking about their well-being."

The Thai office of disaster management said people along the coasts of Phuket, Phang Na and Andaman province should heed warnings and evacuate.

Tsunami warning sirens, set up in many vulnerable areas after the 2004 disaster, were heard in Phuket, where correspondents said people were calmly following evacuation routes to safe zones.

Indonesia straddles the Pacific Ring of Fire, a zone of major seismic activity.

The BBC's Karishma Vaswani in the Indonesian capital, Jakarta, says there were reports of the ground shaking for up to five minutes. Contact with people in the immediate area around the quake has not been possible so far, says our correspondent.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-17675399
http://ptwc.weather.gov/ptwc/?region...012.04.11.1014
http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquak...00905e#summary

[RedneckR0nin]

Just found out about this a hour ago, that is on big motherfucking earthquake. Hopefully everyone will be ok

[TwistedPrincess]

Originally Posted by RedneckR0nin

Just found out about this a hour ago, that is on big motherfucking earthquake. Hopefully everyone will be ok

damned right it was big! originally reported as 8.9 mag but later revised to 8.6. and reported as lasting up to 5 minutes.

the aftershock of 8.2 lasting 4 minutes alone would be enough to put me into cardiac arrest! i've lived in southern calif for around 40 years and only 2 earthquakes really scared me. they were neither as big nor lasted as long (although even less of a minute can seem like forever in such situations).

the tsunami warning has apparently been called off. i'm sure people who were in the warning area were greatly relieved about that.

[bigmikeymike]

FUCK YEAH, bring on the soonamee videos!