Daughter Evacuated to Hotel Roof After Tsunami Warning in Thailand

Tourists evacuated Thailand

A powerful earthquake struck this afternoon off Indonesia's Sumatra island and has  prompted an Indian Ocean-wide tsunami alert to 19 countries.

This is of special significance to our family, as our daughter has just flown into Phuket Thailand this afternoon for a holiday. They have since closed this airport down, as the staff have been evacuated to higher ground. Our daughter has joined the other hotel guests on the roof of the hotel she had just booked into, where they were urgently ordered to go for safety away from the possible Tsunami  

The US Geological Survey says the quake, which was felt as far away as Bangkok and southern India, was detected 33 kilometres beneath the ocean floor about 495 kilometres south-west of Banda Aceh.

The Pacific Tsunami Warning Centre said a tsunami watch was in effect for the entire Indian Ocean and individual countries including Thailand, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Malaysia and India issued tsunami warnings.

Aceh

Authorities say that given the location of the earthquake, it can take quite a while for a tsunami to travel. So they are remaining on alert. The warnings will remain in place for a couple of hours still, and it's really as a precaution to make sure that given the location of the earthquake, that aftershocks and a tsunami doesn't come later on.

Several aftershooks were recorded above 8 on the Richter scale

Update - 11.00pm tsunami warning lifted !!!