A powerful 7.3 magnitude quake struck a remote part of eastern Indonesia on Monday and was felt as far away as the holiday island of Bali and northern Australia, officials said.
The quake hit at a depth of 208 kilometers (129 miles) south of Ambon island in the Banda Sea at 11:53 local time, the US Geological Survey (USGS) said. The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center said the quake was too deep to trigger a destructive wave. There were no reports of casualties or any damage after the quake hit.
The deep and powerful earthquake sent shockwaves around the region, with people on the tourist island of Bali as well as in East Timor reporting feeling the tremor.
Indonesia’s disaster agency, which urged people to “stay calm”, said the tremor was felt weakly in faraway Bali while residents of the northern Australian city of Darwin also felt it.
Australia lies south of Indonesia, the world’s biggest archipelago nation, which is regularly struck by quakes.
The city evacuated parts of its central business district after the quake struck, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation reported. “Wow, that was quite an impact for #Darwin, hope everyone is safe,” the bureau of meteorology in Australia’s Northern Territory said on Twitter.
“It’s probably one of the strongest I’ve felt in my time here in Darwin,” Chris Kent of the Australian Bureau of Meteorology told ABC Radio Darwin. “We ended up wandering outside for about 15 minutes to let things settle down.”
No major damage or injuries were reported in Darwin.
“The earthquake occurred at a depth of about 200 kilometers, and as the energy spreads upwards and outwards from the point at which it occurs, it will be felt in places as far away as Darwin,” said Chris Elders, a quake expert at Australia’s Curtin University.
Indonesia experiences frequent seismic and volcanic activity due to its position on the Pacific “Ring of Fire”, where tectonic plates collide. Indonesia was the epicentre of the Asian tsunami in 2004 that killed more than 170,000 people but the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center said Monday’s quake was too deep to trigger a destructive wave.
