Indonesian high school students fled to higher grounds as tsunami warning sirens blared yesterday, launching an evacuation exercise across a region devastated by a 2004 disaster which killed over two hundred thousand people.
The drill simulated a magnitude nine point three earthquake off the west coast of Indonesia’s Sumatra island.
24 countries bordering the Indian Ocean, from Australia to Yemen, are taking part in the biennial disaster preparedness exercise.
The UN-organised drill saw some 125 students in Meulaboh a coastal town in Aceh province hammered by the 2004 disaster hide under their desks when a mock quake struck before they ran to an open field once the tremor had stopped.
