T

he Volcanology and Geological Disaster Mitigation Center (PVMBG) has called on local people in Situbondo, East Java, to not panic over a recent string of quakes.

The center said that the string of minor quakes that had rocked Situbondo from last Friday to Tuesday were not caused by volcanic activity at Mount Ijen.

A PVMBG official tasked with overseeing volcanoes across Java, Umar Rosadi, said that the mini earthquakes were caused by a shifting of the Eurosia and Indoaustralia plates, and not by activity at Mount Ijen. However, he said, the mountain was still showing high volcanic activity.

“We don’t want the public to be worried about this because we are continuing to monitor the volcanic activity of Ijen,” Umar told The Jakarta Post on Tuesday.

The authorities increased the alert status of the volcano and implemented an exclusion zone.

The 2,368-meter-high volcano is known for its Tosca green crater, which is located on the border between Bondowoso and Banyuwangi regencies, East Java.

Although the volcano is located about 90 kilometers from Situbondo, there were rumors that the earthquakes in the regency were caused by Ijen eruptions, which prompted panic among local people, especially those living along rivers and lava chanels on the slopes of the mountain in Asembagus and Banyuputih districts.

“We heard rumbling and the furniture in our house was shaking when the earthquake hit. We fled the house in a panic. We were even more worried when we were told that Mt. Ijen had erupted,” Imron, a local resident, said.

The head of the Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics Agency’s (BMKG) earthquakes and tsunami division, Suhardjono, said that the earthquakes in Situbondo were categorized as a series of II-IV Modified Mercalli Intensity (MMI) earthquakes.

This type of earthquake, he said, did not constitute a major earthquake and did not cause tsunamis. They mostly have magnitudes of between 2 and 3 on the Richter scale, and as many as 20 can occur in a row.

“These earthquakes are not destructive but can pose a threat if the structures of the people’s houses are not quake-resistant,” Suhardjono said.

Head of the PVMBG’s geophysics station in Tretes, Benni Sipollo, said that his office was analyzing the fault line that had triggered the earthquakes in Situbondo. He also said that the earthquakes had been decreasing in terms of activity.

“Local people are indeed in a panic but we will keep on informing them about how to live with earthquakes as Situbondo is prone to earthquakes,” Benni said.