Over  53 people were killed since last week’s earthquake in the region as rescue teams continued digging through landslides and rubble from Saturday’s 7.7-magnitude earthquake.

M5.7 earthquake near Ruteng, Indonesia — depth 10 km (shallow). A shallow event, typically felt over a wide area of Nusa Tenggara Timur. ⚡

Shallow quakes like this tend to shake more broadly; expect moderate shaking near the epicenter and noticeable shaking across Ruteng and… pic.twitter.com/48VJqEMjNm

— GeoShake | Community Seismic Network (@geoshake_ai) August 20, 2026

Thousands affected in series of earthquakes in Indonesia

More than 900 homes were destroyed and 450 damaged across East Nusa Tenggara province, forcing about 5,000 people into temporary shelters. Officials said 135 people were injured, with at least 241 homes damaged in the Flores region alone. Residents fled in panic when tsunami warnings were issued after the quake, before later being lifted.

Relief workers have distributed rice, ready-to-eat meals, drinking water, blankets and medicine, and emergency shelters have been set up for displaced residents. Authorities say restoring electricity and communications, and delivering aid to remote villages cut off by landslides, remain among the biggest challenges.

Why is Flores so vulnerable to earthquakes?

Indonesia, an archipelago of more than 17,000 islands, sits on the Pacific “Ring of Fire” an arc of seismic faults and volcanoes that makes it one of the most earthquake-prone countries in the world. Flores in particular has a painful history with disaster. A powerful earthquake and tsunami in 1992 killed about 2,500 people on the island. In 2018, a magnitude 7.5 earthquake triggered a tsunami on Sulawesi that killed more than 4,400 people, and in 2004, a magnitude 9.1 quake off Sumatra unleashed a tsunami that killed about 230,000 people across a dozen countries.