A strong earthquake occurred about 3.32pm today in northern Sumatra, Indonesia.

Those in Penang felt the tremors in tall buildings like Komtar - the state administrative tower - and surrounding areas in George Town.

The earthquake occurred 65km south-west of Lhokseumawe, and recorded a magnitude of 6.2 on the Richter scale.

The Malaysian Meteorological Department sent out a preliminary earthquake alert at 3.44pm.

According to Penang Municipal Council building director Yew Tung Seang, Komtar staff were told by the building's security personnel to evacuate their offices in Komtar at 3.57pm.

"The fire and rescue department came in after that," said Yew, whose office is located on the 14th floor.

"Some did not come down as they did not think the tremors were serious," he added, saying about 100 gathered at the ground floor of Komtar.

Yew said that Komtar had in place a standard operating procedure for evacuation if the building's alarm rang.

Reuters quoted the the US Geological Survey as saying that the shallow quake, which was only 10 km deep, struck 188km  south-east of Banda Aceh, the capital of Aceh province.

Meanwhile, Bernama reports that dozens of people have been injured after the quake jolted Aceh Province, said local officials.

  

“There are dozens of people wounded here,” Fauzi, head of local disaster management and mitigation agency in Benermeriah of Aceh Province, told China’s Xinhua news agency via telephone from Benermeriah.

“A report from local meteorology agency said that the second floor of a hospital collapsed,” said Subagio. But he could not confirm the victims.

Sutopo Purwo Nugroho, spokesperson of National Disaster Management and Mitigation Agency, told Xinhua over the phone that at least 10 houses were damaged.

  

Assessment of the risk of the quake is being conducted, he said.

Aceh Province recorded frequent earthquakes. The deadliest one occurred in December 2004 with epicentre in Aceh waters, which claimed 175,000 lives in the province alone and hundreds of thousands more in countries affected by the tsunami.

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