Magnitude 6.9 Earthquake Rattles Indonesia

Indonesia withdrew a tsunami alert issued for parts of its most populous islands, more than two hours after a 7.4 magnitude earthquake struck the Southeast Asian nation.

The quake rattled several areas of Java and Sumatra islands, including the nation’s capital Jakarta, prompting people to flee buildings and briefly halting the city’s subway train service. The epicenter of the quake, which struck at 7:03 p.m. in Jakarta, was 147 kilometers southwest of Sumur, in Banten province, and at a depth of 10 kilometers, according to the Meteorological, Climatological and Geophysics Agency.

The agency had warned the quake may cause tsunami waves as high as 3 meters (10 feet) in the southern parts of Pandeglang, Panaitan island and in the west coast-south of Lampung.

Local television footage showed people in Soekarno-Hatta airport in Jakarta running out of the building and residents from condos evacuating. The national disaster mitigation agency said it hasn’t received information on any casualties or damage.

Indonesia was rattled by more than 11,500 earthquakes last year, almost double the annual average of the past decade, according to the nation’s meteorological agency. The country’s 17,000 islands are prone to earthquakes because the country straddles the Pacific Ring of Fire, an arc of fault lines and volcanoes that causes frequent seismic upheavals.

More than 2,000 people were killed and about 80,000 people displaced in Central Sulawesi in September last year after a devastating earthquake and tsunami struck the island. That was preceded by a series of deadly earthquakes that rattled the popular tourist destination of Lombok island, near Bali.