SCORES DEAD AFTER EARTHQUAKE STRIKES INDONESIA

DEATH TOLL STANDS AT 46 AS HOSPITALS STRUGGLE
TO COPE WITH INJURIES AFTER QUAKE OFF JAVA COAST

JAKARTA, Indonesia — The death toll from a powerful earthquake and several strong aftershocks continued to rise Thursday and Indonesian officials said the figure was likely to increase significantly in the coming days. Indonesia’s disaster management agency said at least 46 people were killed by the 7.1 magnitude quake that struck the principal island of Java on Wednesday afternoon, rocking the province of West Java and causing panic throughout the country’s most populous region. Rescue workers continued to search Thursday for survivors among thousands of collapsed buildings along Java’s southwestern coast. Dozens of people were also reportedly buried beneath a landslide that was triggered by the quake in Cianjur, about 60 miles south of the capital, Jakarta.

The earthquake was felt throughout Java, where half of Indonesia’s 240 million people live, and as far away as the resort island of Bali. Many Indonesians feared a possible repeat of the earthquake and subsequent tsunami in 2004 that killed some 170,000 people in the country’s northernmost province of Aceh. That quake, with a 9.1 magnitude, struck off the western coast of northern Sumatra and created tsunamis that rolled across Aceh and into the Indian Ocean. In all, 227,898 people were killed, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. Since then, Indonesia has been hit by 29 quakes of 6.3 magnitude or higher. A tsunami warning issued minutes after the quake on Wednesday was quickly canceled. Indonesia’s state news agency reported that the tsunami early warning system installed following the 2004 tsunami failed to work in several areas along Java’s coast following Wednesday’s earthquake.In Jakarta, residents fled office towers, shopping centers and some apartment buildings on Wednesday, causing major traffic jams. Indonesia straddles the Pacific “Ring of Fire” where three major tectonic plates, and several smaller ones, continuously grate. The U.S. Geological Survey calls Indonesia the most “complex active tectonic zone on Earth.”

WHAT DO THE VEDIC TEACHINGS TELL US?

The wheel of material miseries is also a creation of the Supreme Personality of Godhead, but He is not under the control of the material energy. Rather, He is the controller of the material energy, whereas we, the living entities, are under its control. When we give up our constitutional position (jivera 'svarupa' haya — krishnera 'nitya-dasa' [Cc. Madhya 20.108]), the Supreme Personality of Godhead creates this material energy and her influence over the conditioned soul. Therefore He is the Supreme, and only He can deliver the conditioned soul from the onslaught of material nature (mām eva ye prapadyante māyām etām taranti te [Bg. 7.14]). Māyā, the external energy, continuously imposes upon the conditioned souls the suffering of the threefold miseries of this material world.

Srila A.C. BV Swami Prabhupada:
"The Srimad Bhagavatam - Purport in Canto 7- Chapter 9 - Verse 22"