New shocks swarming in quake area

DENVER, April 11 (UPI) -- Nearly 300 aftershocks, nine of them significant events, have hit near northwestern Sumatra since a major quake struck the area March 28.

The National Earthquake Information Center reported post-quake activity has included a swarm of 11 events -- including three measuring magnitudes 6.7, 6.3 and 6.4 -- on Sunday, nearly all to the southwest of the large Indonesian island and in the general vicinity of the March 28 temblor. That quake, which registered magnitude 8.7, struck the seafloor, but it killed several thousand people on nearby islands and marked the third major earthquake to hit the area in three months.

Aftershocks registering magnitude 6 or greater on the Richter scale are capable of causing significant damage.

The cycle of tremors has continued with few respites since last Dec. 26, when the area was hit with a giant quake calculated at magnitude 9, the fourth-largest ever recorded. It generated ocean tsunamis that killed more than 300,000 people in South Asia and East Africa and rendered more than 1 million homeless.

The latest round of aftershocks brings the total number of significant events since the Dec. 26 quake to 885, the NEIC reported.