Indonesia counts cost of deadly West Java earthquake: ‘most of the casualties are children’
- At least 268 people were killed in Monday’s quake, many of them children, with more than 300 injured
- Children were still in school when the quake hit at around 1pm. Authorities said on Tuesday that they expected the death toll to rise
The epicentre of the shallow 5.6-magnitude quake hit on land close to the town of Cianjur in a mountainous area of Indonesia’s most populous province. The tremor on Monday afternoon prompted panicked residents to flee onto the streets as buildings collapsed.
Many of the fatalities were caused by falling buildings, the head of Indonesia’s meteorology and geophysics agency, Dwikorita Karnawati, said in a statement.
Overnight a hospital car park in Cianjur was inundated with victims, some treated in makeshift tents, others hooked up to intravenous drips on the pavement, while medical workers stitched up patients under the light of torches.
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“Everything collapsed beneath me and I was crushed beneath this child,” said Cucu, a 48-year-old resident, from the crowded hospital parking area.