As death toll on Indonesia's Lombok tops
100, thousands wait for aid
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[August 07, 2018]
By Kanupriya Kapoor
KAYANGAN, Indonesia (Reuters) - The death
toll from a powerful earthquake that hit Indonesia's tourist island of
Lombok topped 100 on Tuesday as rescuers found victims under wrecked
buildings, while thousands left homeless in the worst-affected areas
waited for aid to arrive.
A woman was pulled alive from the rubble of a collapsed grocery store in
the north, near the epicenter of Sunday's 6.9 magnitude quake, the
second tremor to rock the tropical island in a week.
That was a rare piece of good news as hopes of finding more survivors
faded and a humanitarian crisis loomed for thousands left homeless by
the disaster in the rural area and in desperate need of clean water,
food, medicine and shelter.
Sutopo Purwo Nugroho, the spokesman of Indonesia's disaster mitigation
agency (BNPB) put the toll at 105, including two on the neighboring
island of Bali to the west, where the quake was also felt - and the
figure was expected to rise.
Lombok had already been hit by a 6.4 magnitude earthquake on July 29
that killed 17 people and briefly stranded several hundred trekkers on
the slopes of a volcano.
Indonesia sits on the Pacific Ring of Fire and is regularly hit by
earthquakes. In 2004, the Indian Ocean tsunami killed 226,000 people in
13 countries, including more than 120,000 in Indonesia.
(For graphic on earthquake in Indonesia's Lombok, click
https://tmsnrt.rs/2OfAvrV)
THOUSANDS SCATTERED ON HILLS
Few buildings were left standing in Kayangan on the island's northern
end, where residents told Reuters that as many as 40 died.
Some villagers used sledgehammers and ropes to start clearing the rubble
of broken homes, but others, traumatized by continued aftershocks, were
too afraid to venture far from tents and tarpaulins set up in open
spaces.
There has been little government relief for the area, where the greatest
need is for water and food, as underground water sources have been
blocked by the quake and shops destroyed or abandoned.
About 75 percent of the north has been without electricity since Sunday,
officials said, and some communities were hard to reach because bridges
were damaged and trees, rocks and sand lay across roads cracked wide
open in places by the tremor.
"Thousands of people moved to scattered locations," Sutopo told a news
conference in Jakarta.
"People have moved to the hillsides where they feel safer. It's
difficult for help to reach them. We advise people to come down and move
closer to the camps."
Aid agency Oxfam said it was providing clean drinking water and
tarpaulin shelters to 5,000 survivors, but the need was much greater,
with more than 20,000 estimated to have been displaced.
"Thousands ... are under open skies in need of drinking water, food,
medical supplies, and clothes," it said in a statement. "Clean drinking
water is scarce due to the extremely dry weather."
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Rescuers and policemen walk on top of a collapsed mosque as they try
to find survivors after an earthquake hit on Sunday in Pemenang,
Lombok Island, Indonesia, August 7, 2018. REUTERS/Beawiharta
Villagers in Pemenang on Lombok's northwestern shoulder heard cries
for help emerging from the mangled concrete of a collapsed minimart
on Tuesday and alerted rescuers. Four hours later they pulled out
alive Nadia Revanale, 23.
"First we used our hands to clear the debris, then hammers, chisels
and machines," Marcos Eric, a volunteer, told Reuters. "It took many
hours but we're thankful it worked and this person was found alive."
Rescuers heard a weak voice coming from under the wreckage of a
nearby two-storey mosque, where four people were believed to have
been trapped when the building pancaked.
"We are looking for access. We have a machine that can drill or cut
through concrete, so we may use that. We are waiting for heavier
equipment," Teddy Aditya, an official of the Indonesian Search and
Rescue Agency (Basarnas), told Reuters.
TOURIST EXODUS
Thousands of tourists have left Lombok since Sunday evening, fearing
further earthquakes, some on extra flights added by airlines and
some on ferries to Bali.
Officials said about 4,600 foreign and domestic tourists had been
evacuated from the three Gili islands off the northwest coast of
Lombok, where two people died and fears of a tsunami spread soon
after the quake.
Saffron Amis, a British student on Gili Trawangan - the largest of
the islands fringed by white beaches and surrounded by turquoise sea
- said at least 200 people were stranded there with more flowing in
from the other two, Gili Air and Gili Meno.
"We still have no wi-fi and very little power. Gili Air has run out
of food and water so they have come to us," she told Reuters in a
text message, adding later that she had been taken by boat to the
main island en route to Bali.
(Additional reporting by Angie Teo and by Agustinus Beo Da Costa,;
Fransiska Nangoy and Fanny Potkin in JAKARTA; Writing by John
Chalmers; Editing by Clarence Fernandez)
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