Lombok got hit by its second deadly quake in a week — and thousands are fleeing

A major disaster relief operation is underway on the Indonesian island of Lombok after a powerful 6.9-magnitude earthquake struck Sunday, killing at least 98 people.

Indonesia’s disaster relief authority, the National Disaster Mitigation Agency, said it expected the death toll to rise steeply once search and rescue teams worked through the rubble of an estimated 13,000 damaged homes, many of which were built from weak construction materials. More than 200 people have been injured by the quake, many of them in the north of Lombok.

The quake, which has left some areas without power and communications, came just seven days after another deadly tremor jolted the island, killing 17 people. Sunday’s quake was also felt on the neighboring island of Bali, were it killed two people, as well as in parts of East Java.

Many islanders have been evacuated to temporary shelters, and in some parts of Lombok, such as the village of Mentigi, locals have fled to the surrounding hills and are sleeping under tarpaulins for fear of their homes collapsing during aftershocks.

Lombok and Bali are home to some seven million people, and receive millions of tourists each year. Sunday’s earthquake sparked a mass exodus of spooked vacationers from the islands.

About 1,000 tourists were evacuated from the three Gili islands north of Lombok which are popular with divers, amid fears of a tsunami. Footage posted to social media showed frantic scenes as hundreds of tourists crowded on the beach in a bid to make it on board the boats ferrying people off the island.

Michelle Thompson, an American tourist who was among the crowds battling to make it off the Gilis, told Reuters they faced a violent “scramble” to make it onboard the boats.

“People were just throwing their suitcases on board and I had to struggle to get my husband on because he was bleeding,” she said.

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Indonesia is located on the Pacific Ring of Fire and is regularly hit with major earthquakes and tsunamis. The Indian Ocean tsunami of 2004 killed more than 120,000 people in Indonesia.

Cover image: Chief Water Police of Lombok Dewa Wijaya takes a picture in front of hundreds of people attempting to leave the Gili Islands after an earthquake Gili Trawangan, in Lombok, Indonesia, August 6, 2018. (Indonesia Water Police/Handout/via REUTERS)