The death toll from the magnitude 7.7 earthquake that struck off Indonesia's Flores Island rose to at least 70 by Wednesday, with more than 40,000 people still sheltering in tents and evacuation centers, according to AFP.
Berton Suar Pelita Panjaitan, a spokesman for Indonesia's BNPB national disaster agency, said Monday that the toll had climbed from 54 to 68 and that more than 200 people were injured, Al Jazeera reported. The agency later put the number of injured at 213.
The quake hit at 5:58 a.m. local time Saturday, with an epicenter about 42 miles north northwest of the city of Ende in East Nusa Tenggara province at a depth of roughly six miles, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. The USGS estimated that more than half a million people on Flores felt very strong shaking.
More than 1,600 aftershocks have been recorded, though only 54 were strong enough for residents to feel, the largest reaching magnitude 6.2, according to Indonesia's meteorology agency, BMKG. Thousands of residents slept outside under tarpaulin tents rather than risk going back into cracked buildings, AFP reported.
More than 1,300 homes were damaged and nearly 250 destroyed on Flores alone, BNPB said. An Associated Press photojournalist described fallen trees blocking roads, boulders hurled down slopes by landslides and buildings that collapsed onto parked cars.
Rescue teams spent Monday clearing landslides to reach communities cut off in the island's mountainous interior. Survivors in outlying camps said little aid had arrived and described dividing single loaves of bread among several people. Evacuation tents lacked food, drinking water, blankets and medicine, Time reported.
The quake set off small tsunamis at 16 locations across four provinces, according to BMKG. The waves reached several small coastal villages and caused some damage to infrastructure before the tsunami warning was lifted, The Associated Press reported.
Monday was Indonesia's 81st Independence Day. At the ceremony in Jakarta, President Prabowo Subianto asked participants to pray for those affected in East Nusa Tenggara and led a nationwide moment of silence.
For many on Flores, the shaking revived memories of December 1992, when a quake of similar force and the tsunami it triggered killed about 2,500 people along the same coastline.
Indonesia sits on the Pacific Ring of Fire, where converging tectonic plates produce frequent earthquakes and volcanic activity. Officials warned that with aftershocks continuing and damage assessments still underway, the full scale of the destruction is not yet known.