Miftah, one of the residents, said to Antara that him and his family had no idea where to flee "as until now (9.45pm local time), we still feel aftershocks once every five minutes. Our house collapsed and so did my neighbor`s. We are now gathering on the street, which is safer".
Besides aftershocks, power has also been down and so people could not do much to evacuate victims.
"It was reported that some had been buried under debris in the neighboring village but we faced difficulties in helping them because it was very dark," he said.
He said some people had been injured due to the quake and so they chose to stay in the streets to wait for the situation to calm down.
He said him and his family were safe because they could immediately rush out of the house soon after the quake.
The chief of the Djalaluddin airport of Gorontalo, Power AS, said the Mutiara Sis Al Jufri airport in Central Sulawesi will be closed until 7.20 pm on Saturday.
"The NOTAM on the closure of Palu`s airport was produced this evening. However, all flights scheduled from Gorontalo to Palu had taken off before the quake," he said.
Reporting by Debby H
Editing by Yoseph Haryadi
Reporter: Antara
Editor: Suharto
Copyright © ANTARA 2018
