Earthquakes are very common in Indonesia, as it is on the Ring of Fire area of tectonic activity in the Pacific Ocean. The Ring of Fire is “a string of volcanoes and sites of seismic activity, or earthquakes, around the edges of the Pacific Ocean.” Approximately, 90% of all earthquakes occur along the Ring of Fire, and there are 75% of all active volcanoes on Earth in that ring. The Volcanoes in Antarctica, including Mount Erebus, the southernmost volcano on Earth are included in the Ring of Fire. Ocean trenches are also part of this ring. As the name suggests, it is not actually a circular ring.
On Monday, Cianjur town in West Java, Indonesia was hit by an earthquake of 5.6. According to the US Geological Survey Data, it had a shallow depth of 10km (6 miles). The tremors were felt 100 k away in the capital Jakarta as well. People were evacuated from the high-rise buildings. There have been 140 aftershocks since Monday.
The exact number of casualties in the earthquake in Indonesia remains unconfirmed yet. According to the regional Governor Ridwan Kamil, a total of 13,000 had been displaced by the disaster, and more remained trapped in isolated places. Rescue operations are going on and the power cut might take some time to recover.
Ridwan Kamil told the news sources, “The follow-up earthquake [sic] is still happening. Currently, we are coordinating [our mission] to focus on search and rescue…[as] many people are still missing mostly in remote [hilly] areas [and] mountain tops.” He also said that the majority of casualties were children as the earthquake came during school hours. 58,000 people have been evacuated to the refugee camps that are set up.
According to the National Disaster Mitigation Agency, almost 22,000 homes have been damaged. Landslides were also triggered which buried entire villages in the West Java Mountains.