Massive 7.5 magnitude earthquake hits Indonesia, tsunami warning issued

A massive earthquake, measuring 7.5 on the Richter magnitude scale, hit the Indonesian island of Sulawesi on Friday. Following the earthquake, Indonesian authorities sounded a tsunami alert and asked people to evacuate to higher grounds.

According to the US Geological Survey (USGS), the epicentre of the powerful magnitude 7.5 quake was at the depth of six miles about 35 miles northeast of the Indonesian town Donggala. 

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An eyewitness from the Donggala town said that everything in his house started shaking and he ran outside. He, however, said that there wasn’t great panic in his neighbourhood as most people evacuated their house timely.

“All the things in my house were swaying and the quake left a small crack on my wall,” PTI cited The Associated Press to quote him.

“But this was not the first time. Last week we felt an earthquake that had a stronger tremor so this time we didn’t panic, just avoided the buildings and now everything has returned to normal,” he added.

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Indonesia is prone to earthquakes because of its location on the “Ring of Fire,” an arc of volcanoes and fault lines in the Pacific Basin. In December 2004, a massive magnitude 9.1 earthquake off Sumatra in western Indonesia triggered a tsunami that killed 230,000 people in a dozen countries.

(With inputs from PTI)