Community | October 03, 2009 | 2 comments

Sumatra quake 'levelled villages'

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Mobius2012
Thousands of people may have died in remote village areas when a powerful earthquake struck Sumatra last week, emergency workers and officials fear.

Some villages were completely destroyed in landslides, with access roads torn apart by the quake preventing medical teams reaching the injured.

Aid is now arriving in Indonesia, but hopes are fading of finding survivors in the worst-hit city of Padang.

More than 1,000 people have died in the city. About 3,000 others are missing.

Australian, British, Japanese and South Korean rescuers have arrived in Indonesia and the EU and Russia are also sending help.
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2 comments // Sumatra quake 'levelled villages'

  • JanforGore
    • 0
      JanforGore  
    • According to reports, four villages were wiped off the map which would suggest many lost lives. The tectonic activity of the Pacific Ring of Fire has been more volatile in recent years. If it isn't an earthquake that completely causes a rift, climate change will cause sea level rise to inundate this area. The prognosis is not good for Indonesia. So this brings a question for the climate summit in Copenhagen: at what point would moving people from here be considered and where would they go? I also know that in Aceh, Exxon and other oil companies are continuously drilling off the coast, or at least they were. is the drilling exacerbating the tectonic shifts? I don't know, but this area has seen way too much tragedy in the last five years.

    • 2 years ago
  • Chique
    • 0
      Chique  
    • The still picture of the huge sink hole / mud slide at the BBC link (enlarged) is terrifying. I can't imagine what living through this must be like for the survivors who then have to deal with the lives lost.

    • 2 years ago
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