INDONESIA, August 9: The Indonesian island of Lombok was shaken by a third big earthquake in little more than a week Thursday as the official death toll from the most powerful of the quakes topped 300.

The strong aftershock, measured at magnitude 5.9 by the US Geological Survey, caused panic, damage to buildings, landslides and injuries. It was centered in the northwest of the island and didn’t have the potential to cause a tsunami, Indonesia’s geological agency said.

Videos showed rubble strewn across streets and clouds of dust enveloping buildings. In northern Lombok, some people leaped from their vehicles on a traffic jammed road while an elderly woman standing in the back of a pickup truck wailed “God is Great.” An Associated Press reporter in the provincial capital Mataram saw people injured by the tremor and a hospital moved patients outside.

The aftershock had caused more “trauma,” said national disaster agency spokesman Sutopo Purwo Nugroho.

Wiranto, Indonesia’s top security minister, told reporters the death toll from Sunday’s magnitude 7.0 quake had risen to 319. The announcement came after an inter-agency meeting was called to resolve wildly different figures from different agencies.

“We are taking action as fast as we can to handle this disaster,” he said.

Grieving relatives were burying their dead and medics tended to people whose broken limbs hadn’t yet been treated in the days since the quake. The Red Cross said it was focusing relief efforts on an estimated 20,000 people yet to get any assistance.

In Kopang Daya village in the hard-hit Tanjung district of north Lombok, a distraught family was burying their 13-year-old daughter who was struck by a collapsing wall and then trampled when the quake Sunday caused a stampede at her Islamic boarding school.

Villagers and relatives prayed outside a tent where the girl’s body lay inside covered in a white cloth.

“She was praying when the earthquake happened,” said her uncle Tarna, who gave a single name. “She was trying to get out, but she got hit by a wall and fell down. Children were running out from the building in panic and she was stepped on by her friends,” he said.

Thousands of homes were damaged or destroyed in Sunday’s quake and more than 150,000 people are homeless. The earlier earthquakes also left cracks in walls and roofs, making the weakened buildings susceptible to collapse.

“People are always saying they need water and tarps,” said Indonesian Red Cross spokesman Arifin Hadi. He said the agency has sent 20 water trucks to five remote areas, including one village of about 1,200 households.

He also said they’re continuing to look for people with untreated injuries.

In Kopang Daya, injured villagers got their first proper treatment Thursday after medics arrived with a portable X-ray and other supplies. They tended to an elderly woman with an injured face and hips who’d been knocked over by her grandson as they scrambled from their house.

“Her son managed to get out from the house when the earthquake hit but the grandmother and grandson were left behind,” said a relative Nani Wijayanti. “The grandson tried to help the grandmother to get out but he pushed too hard,” she said.

A July 29 quake on Lombok killed 16 people.

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 triggered a tsunami that killed 230,000 people in a dozen countries.

Wiranto, who goes by one name, said the government will develop a plan to rebuild communities on Lombok, which like its more famous neighbor Bali is a popular tourist destination with powder white beaches, mountains and a lush interior.

“We will make a new roadmap for what we are going to do after this emergency response is finished,” he said. “For example, how we can deal with the number of damaged houses, mosques, schools, hospitals. Who will rebuild and how much money and how long it takes.” AP

JAKARTA: The death toll from a tunnel collapse at the world’s second largest copper mine run by Freeport McMoRan Copper & Gold Inc’s Indonesian unit was raised to 28 on Wednesday as rescuers gave up hope of finding any more survivors.

Arizona-based Freeport closed the remote Papua mine on Wednesday last week, a day after a training tunnel away from its main operations fell in on 38 workers. Ten workers were rescued, but the search for the seven still listed as missing has now turned into an attempt the retrieve their bodies.

“We continue to grieve with the families even as we close this grim chapter,” Freeport Indonesia President Director Rozik Soetjipto said in a statement.

“There is still much to do for us to provide the best care and support for the injured and the families of the bereaved.”

Although Indonesia’s mining sector has a poor safety record, last week’s tunnel accident is one of the country’s worst-ever mining disasters, industry officials say.

Soetjipto said on Saturday that once the rescue efforts were finished the company would launch an investigation with the help of international experts and Indonesian government officials.

Freeport emergency response teams, who are working around the clock to try to recover the remains of the dead, have been hampered by narrow tunnels and loose rock at the site, Wednesday’s statement said.

It made no mention of the investigation or the current suspension of mining operations.

A union leader last week demanded that Freeport keep the mine closed while the cause of the accident was investigated.

The incident’s impact on global copper supply has so far been limited as the Grasberg mine keeps stockpiles in reserve in case of disruptions, but that would change if any investigation and closure drags on.

I Made Krisna Maharta, an official with Bali’s search and rescue agency, said all of the passengers and crew were safely rescued and that 22 people were taken to three different hospitals with various injuries. He said initial reports showed there were 101 passengers and seven crew members aboard the plane.

TV footage showed police and rescuers using rubber boats to evacuate passengers and crew members. A photo on local channel TV One showed the plane with a large crack in its body sitting on top of the water.

The Transportation Ministry’s director general of aviation, Harry Bakti Gumay, said the plane overshot the runway and fell into the sea from a height of about 50 meters (55 yards). The cause of the accident was unclear, and Gumay said an investigation was under way.

Hospital officials and paramedics said at least seven passengers were taken to Sanglah hospital with head wounds and broken bones. Many passengers arrived there with wet clothes and bruises.

“The aircraft was in landing position when suddenly I saw it getting closer to the sea, and finally it hit the water,” Dewi, a passenger who sustained head wounds in the crash, told The Associated Press. “All of the passengers were screaming in panic in fear they would drown. I left behind my belongings and went to an emergency door. I got out of the plane and swam before rescuers jumped in to help me.”

Bali Police Chief Arif Wahyunadi said the plane originated from Bandung, the capital of West Java province, and was landing in Bali.

Lion Air is a low-cost carrier that holds about a 45 percent market share in Indonesia, a sprawling archipelago that’s seeing a boom in both economic growth and air travel.

Lion inked a $24 billion deal last month to buy 234 Airbus planes, the biggest order ever for the French aircraft maker. It also gave Boeing its largest-ever order when it finalized a deal for 230 planes last year. The planes will be delivered from 2014 through 2026.

“The latest data that we have today (Monday) showed that 20 people have been killed by the floods,” Nelis Zuliansri , spokesperson of the agency told Xinhua over phone. “They were killed by electricity shocks and being drawn,” she said.Lukman said that the floods have affected 249, 154 people.

The floods have been caused by a five-year cycle of monsoon rain, according to the meteorology and geophysics agency.The disaster paralyzed business and official activities in Jakarta on Thursday as it inundated business centers and government official buildings.Jakarta policymakers have declared an emergency status by up to Jan. 27.