29 Killed As Earthquakes Rock Indonesian Island

A series of earthquakes hit Papua, Indonesia's easternmost province, yesterday morning, killing at least 29 people and injuring up to 200, local authorities said.

Most of the casualties were in and around the town of Nabire on the north coast of the province, which comprises the western half of New Guinea island and is 1,900 miles from the capital, Jakarta.

The most powerful of the 12 earthquakes measured 6.9 on the Richter scale and happened just after 6am. Its epicentre was a few miles east of Nabire.

Muhamad Son Ani, the local police chief, said it damaged the airport, the main hospital, churches and numerous houses and offices.

"Most people were killed and injured by falling masonry," he said. "It was hard to treat the injured because the hospital was also damaged. So the staff used emergency tents."

He said thousands of people were afraid to return to their damaged homes and were camping in the open. "They are scared of further earthquakes," he said.

Dortheus Asmurif, an official in Jayapura, the provincial capital, said some of the more seriously injured were evacuated by boat to the town of Biak and by air to Timika but it was proving hard to get to the remote location.

"The problem is that the airport can only accommodate very small planes now," he said. "We will try and get some Cessnas or Twin Otters in tomorrow."

Mr Dortheus said the latest death toll was 29 but it may rise. "We have not yet received detailed reports from the remote villages," he said. "Roads have been damaged and communications cut."

The quakes were also felt in the towns of Enarotali and Manokwari, 150 miles away.

A spokesman for the oil giant BP, which is developing a multi-billion-pound gas facility between Nabire and Manokwari at Bintuni Bay, said people on the site barely felt it.

Mr Son Ani said the death toll would have been much higher if the quake had struck half an hour earlier. "People would have still been in bed and so would not have been able to escape," he said.

Earthquakes and volcanic eruptions occur fairly regularly in Indonesia, the world's biggest archipelago country, but they rarely cause many casualties.

The country is prone to earthquakes because of its location on the Pacific "Ring of Fire" - volcanic arcs and oceanic trenches partly encircling the Pacific basin.