Strong Earthquake Strikes Indonesia's Flores Island

A powerful earthquake measuring magnitude 7.7 struck the Indonesian island of Flores early Saturday, killing at least five people. Emanuel Melkiades Laka Lena, the governor of East Nusa Tenggara Province, told a press conference that five people died after rubble collapsed on them as they slept.

The US Geological Survey (USGS) reported that the epicenter was located off the island's northern coast, approximately 68 km northwest of the city of Ende. The quake's focus was at a relatively shallow depth of 10 km below the Earth's surface.

Two strong aftershocks, measuring magnitude 5.6 and 5.9, followed in the same area. Indonesia, which consists of more than 17,000 islands, experiences frequent earthquakes because the country sits within the Pacific Ring of Fire, a zone of heightened seismic activity along the edges of the Pacific Ocean where several tectonic plates converge.

(reuters, afp)