Nearly 300 dead on Nias: report
March 29, 2005
From:
TODAY'S powerful earthquake off Sumatra killed about 300 people on Indonesia's Nias Island, the Associated Press reported today.
It quoted a local official as saying at least 296 people had died.
A police spokesman told the agency about 70 per cent of the houses and buildings in a market area in Gunungsitoli had collapsed.
Tsunami danger not over: Aussie
March 29, 2005
From: AAP
AN earthquake off Indonesia could still produce a tsunami as big as the killer waves which left nearly 300,000 dead following a similar quake in December, seismologists in Australia said today.
Australia's bureau of meteorology said a 25cm tsunami had already hit Australia's remote Cocos Island and bigger tidal surges were expected to strike Australia's west coast.
Phil Cummins, of Geoscience Australia, said that although no major tsumani had yet been reported near the quake epicenter off Indonesia's Sumatra island, a big tidal surge could still be heading across the Indian Ocean towards Africa.
"I would say there is still potential for this to have generated a large tsunami," he said.
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Australia's bureau of meteorology initially reported that the tsunami measured just 10cm at Cocos Island, located in the deep waters of the Indian Ocean south of Sumatra, but later upgraded that to 25cm.
"That's fairly big for the deep ocean," Mr Cummins said of the wave which hit Cocos, adding that an alert had been issued for a one metre surge expected to hit the Western Australia coast.
Asked if the east coast of Africa could still be struck by a major tsunami from the latest quake, Mr Cummins said: "I would say it's still something we have to regard as a possibility.
"We've seen the thing at Cocos Island and that really does tell us we have to exercise caution."
Nias has a population of 600,000 so even without a large tsunami quite a lot of people are going to end up having been killed.
Sad, You just know that total is going up, Prayers.