JAKARTA LIFE'S STYLE
President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono on Thursday afternoon visited several locations worst hit by Wednesday`s magnitude 7.6 quake in Padang, West Sumatra.
Accompanied by First Lady Ani Yudhoyono, the President`s first stop in the city was the four-storey Hotel Ambacang on Jalan Gereja which the quake had levelled to the ground.
Some 200 people, participants of a symposium that was underway at the hotel when the quake struck, were believed to be buried under the rubble.
The president closely watched the process of evacuation of victims done manually as well as using heavy-duty equipment by personnel from the military and a Search and Rescue team.
Yudhoyono also visited the ruins of a three-storey building belonging to Gama Study Center on Jalan Proklamasi that was also destroyed by the quake. Around 50 children who were studying at the center were killed.
After visiting the two locations where the greatest number of dead victims had been found, the President proceeded to Semen Padang where he would spend the night.
In remarks to a crowd in front of Hotel Ambacang, the President called on the people to remain tough and strong in facing the disaster and also asked rescue teams to work swiftly to find survivors.
Until Thursday evening, a total of 364 people had been found dead, namely 197 in Padang, 154 in Pariaman, four in Pesisir Selatan, seven in Bukittinggi and two in Solok.
According to the command center set up at the house of the West Sumatra governor in Padang, 83 people had sustained serious injuries and 2,094 others light injuries. A total of 740 houses in the provincial city had been heavily damaged.(ANTARA News)
0 komentar:
Post a Comment