In the capital of the province of Padong and in other cities along the west coast of Sumatra, people spent most of the night from Wednesday to Thursday. And thousands fled out of fear of another tsunami to higher-lying areas. Several tsunami alerts were given but later lifted. There were about 20 medium to severe earthquakes during the course of Wednesday night.

The first had a magnitude of 8.4 on the Richter scale; two further quakes had magnitudes of over 7. The quakes were felt in the capital Jakarta and even in Singapore, 700 kilometres away.

The authorities gave out at least five tsunami warnings, but they were each lifted shortly afterwards. Damages to buildings as well as interrupted electricity and phone connections were reported in the city of Bengkulu, closest to the earthquake's epicentre

Total damages not yet known

The total damages cannot yet be ascertained. At least ten people are known to have died and about 70 are injured. But the speaker for the Indonesian Earthquake Centre in Bandung said there were no exact figures. However, the authorities fear there are still many victims under the rubble.

On national television on Thursday, Indonesia's Vice-President Yussuf Kalla praised the fast reactions of the people in the area:

"We thank the people in the coastal regions," he said. "They reacted fast and fled to higher-lying, more secure areas after the tsunami warnings. The earthquake's victims have all our sympathy."

International aid

More and more international aid is also on its way to the earthquake-affected area. The United Nations have deployed a unit from its catastrophe aid agency to Bengkulu from Banda Aceh. Hundreds of emergency tents have been put up for people who have lost or fled their homes because of the earthquake.

Earthquakes of this strength and frequency are unusual even in Indonesia, where quakes often arise along the tectonic crack on the west coast -- also known as the Pacific fire-ring. Quakes of magnitude 8 occur once a year at the most.

Naturally, people have been reminded of the December 2004 tsunami which, alone on Sumatra, killed 170,000.