JAKARTA: Buildings and homes collapsed like cards, trapping thousands of people under the rubble, when a powerful earthquake rocked West Sumatra province yesterday afternoon.
The initial death toll was put at 75, but Indonesian Vice-President Jusuf Kalla told reporters in Jakarta last night that the number was certain to rise and the authorities were bracing themselves for the worst.
The 7.6-magnitude quake devastated the provincial capital of Padang, with a population of 900,000, and surrounding areas.
The tremors could be felt as far away as Singapore and Malaysia, where buildings swayed and sent people running onto the streets in fear.
The quake came just hours after another massive 8.0-magnitude temblor struck the Samoan islands in the Pacific Ocean, triggering tsunami waves of up to 7.5m, leaving at least 113 people dead.
In Padang, Indonesian media reported that buildings, including a major hospital and a well-known shopping mall, had collapsed and that fire had broken out in some of them.
'Houses and buildings have collapsed, causing thousands of people to be trapped inside in the rubble,' the Health Ministry's crisis centre head, Mr Rustam Pakaya, was quoted as saying.
The quake also knocked out power and telecommunication lines.
The province's main airport, the Minangkabau International Airport, was closed after the roof of one of the halls caved in, but one official was quoted as saying that it would be reopened this morning.
Indonesia's meteorological station said the quake struck 50km off the coast of Padang along the same fault line that triggered the December 2004 tsunami which killed more than 200,000 people in Aceh, North Sumatra, and thousands more across the Indian Ocean.
Witnesses told TVOne station that frightened residents in Padang and the neighbouring town of Pariaman ran out of homes and buildings when the quake hit just after 5pm local time.
'There was panic as people streamed out of their homes,' said a Madam Mariam. 'Many houses just collapsed and one building near my home was on fire.'
Reporter Agus Wahyudi said a two-storey building which housed a car showroom collapsed, trapping three salesmen under the rubble.
Not far away, Padang's main shopping mall was ablaze. The fire was believed to have started in the kitchen of one of several restaurants on the top floor, Mr Agus added.
On the streets, a massive traffic jam built up as motorists got stuck because the lights were not working.
A heavy downpour added to the woes of residents, who pitched tents in the open as they were afraid to return to their damaged homes.
In Pariaman, a former political analyst and Golkar politician, Mr Indra Piliang, said that almost all the houses in his hometown were reduced to rubble.
'Only my grandmother's house is still standing because it is made of wood,' he told the detik.com news portal.
Another resident, Ms Yuliarni, told TVOne that hundreds were trapped after many houses in the town were flattened.
Welfare Minister Aburizal Bakrie last night warned the authorities to be prepared for the worst, saying the damage could be as bad as that caused by a 2006 earthquake in the central Java city of Yogyakarta.
It left 5,000 dead, and damaged or destroyed 150,000 homes.
President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono was yesterday on his way back home after attending the Group of 20 Summit in the United States.
Straits Times, 1 Oct 2009, The Padang Earthquake.
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