Third quake in two days rocks coast of Indonesia

PADANG, Indonesia:

Another earthquake shook the coast of the Indonesian island of Sumatra on Thursday, after two powerful quakes struck earlier that day and on Wednesday, but the area escaped a major tsunami like the one that devastated the region in 2004.

More than a dozen people were reported to have died in the earthquakes, and hundreds of buildings were damaged in the coastal cities of Padang and Bengkulu in western Sumatra.

The shaking continued through the day Thursday, keeping residents on edge. Some fled to higher ground away from the coastline; many more camped outdoors in the streets and parks.

The first and biggest of the shocks, with a magnitude of 8.4 on Wednesday evening, was the third in a cluster of earthquakes in the area in the past three years with a magnitude of more than 8.0.

That cluster could be a signal that the western coast of Sumatra, which stretches 1,100 miles, could face still more danger, scientists say.

am more convinced than ever that we are going to be seeing a significantly larger earthquake in the area," said Kerry Sieh, a seismologist from the California Institute of Technology who has spent several decades studying earthquake risk around Sumatra.

"These three big earthquakes, they just encircle this big patch that has not failed, a big strong part of the fault that hasn't broken yet," he said. "The million-dollar question is: Is it over?"

The major earthquake on Wednesday, about 60 miles southwest of Bengkulu, was followed by a series of aftershocks, and one of them, on Thursday morning, was a serious earthquake on its own.

It struck almost 200 miles northwest of the epicenter of the earlier earthquake, or about 125 miles to the northwest of Bengkulu, and had a magnitude of 7.8.

It was followed shortly before noon by another significant earthquake, with a magnitude of 7.1.

As the earth shook along the Sumatran coast, tsunami warnings were repeatedly issued and then withdrawn by governments in Asian and African countries along the Indian Ocean.

The range of nations in the alert reflected the damage done in December 2004, when a tsunami took an estimated 230,000 lives on the Indian Ocean rim, with the heaviest death toll in Aceh Province in northern Sumatra.

In recent months, Padang stepped up a public education campaign, drawing on the lessons of Aceh. Residents there headed for higher ground in a relatively orderly way after the latest quakes, one earthquake monitor said.

"A few people panicked, but the city is under control," said Patra Rina Dewi, who leads an organization called Kogami, which has been educating residents about earthquakes and tsunamis. "Our mayor was on the radio giving instructions to the community and to agencies about what they should do."

His reports were relayed by mosques using loudspeakers commonly used to call Muslims to prayer.

A radio and Internet early warning system installed in Padang in response to the 2004 tsunami failed to work.

"We are studying what went wrong," said Willy Wicaksono, speaking by telephone from the Padang Emergency Command Center. "We were only using the two-meter band radio and the phone. Fortunately the phones were quite O.K."

Roads and communications were damaged, making it hard to assess the full scope of the damage and casualties.

Bengkulu, a city of 1.2 million, was the closest large community to the latest earthquakes, and it had the most damage.

Vice Governor Syamlan, who like many Indonesians uses only one name, said that 10 people died in Bengkulu. He said 2,406 buildings were destroyed or heavily damaged, as well as 13 bridges and roads.

One person died in Padang and three others in the surrounding area, said a local journalist, Sofiardi, quoting official figures.

A local journalist, Mardyansyah, said 10,000 people were in hastily erected refugee camps. The ground continues to shake, and they are afraid to return home for fear of another major shock, he said.

"People are running out of food, water, clothes and medicine," he said. "Many are injured, but they cannot be taken to the hospital because part of the hospital building has collapsed."

The hospital in Padang was also damaged, and patients were camping out in tents in the parking lot on Thursday. One woman gave birth in the parking lot.

One resident of Bengkulu, Yunus, 46, loaded his family into a car and fled one of the worst-hit areas, Mukumuku, a village within the city.

"The first earthquake was so strong," he said. "I heard people shouting, 'Earthquake! Tsunami! Earthquake! Tsunami!' The ground was shaking and we all ran from our houses."

Just two buildings were officially reported to have collapsed in Padang, with an additional 159 heavily damaged.

the relatively light damage, many residents of Padang appeared deeply upset by the continuing strong shocks.

"We are very stressed," said Wawan, 36. "Every time we think it's safe, another tremor rolls underneath our feet, and we don't know what to expect."

Many, like Charli Josal, 25, who works in a hardware store, fled to higher ground inland — and said they would stay there.

"It's not safe down there," he said.