Earthquake jolts central Sulawesi in Indonesia

JAKARTA — A magnitude 6.1 earthquake jolted the Indonesian island of Sulawesi on Friday, but no damage or casualties were immediately reported.

The U.S. Geological Survey said the earthquake at a depth of 18 kilometers (11 miles) was centered about 30 kilometers (19 miles) north of the central Sulawesi town of Donggala.

Indonesia’s meteorology and geophysics agency said it didn’t have the potential to cause a tsunami.

Donggala resident Mohammad Fikri said by telephone that he ran from his house but there wasn’t great panic in his neighborhood.

“All the things in my house were swaying and the quake left a small crack on my wall,” he told The Associated Press.

“But this was not the first time. Last week we felt an earthquake that had a stronger tremor so this time we didn’t panic, just avoided the buildings and now everything has returned to normal,” Fikri said.

The National Disaster Mitigation Agency said the tremor was felt for about 10 seconds in Donggala.

Indonesia is prone to earthquakes because of its location on the “Ring of Fire,” an arc of volcanoes and fault lines in the Pacific Basin.

In December 2004, a massive magnitude 9.1 earthquake off Sumatra in western Indonesia triggered a tsunami that killed 230,000 people in a dozen countries. /kga