An earthquake measuring 5.1 on the Richter Scale jolted Tual, Maluku Province, on Monday at 00.41 am Western Indonesian Standard Time, ANTARA reported. The earthquake`s epicenter was located at 5.1 degrees southern latitude, 133.50 degrees eastern longitude, at a depth of 10 km below sea level, according to information from the Meteorological, Geophysics and Climatology Agency (BMKG) here on Monday. The temblor was around 117 km northeast of Tual, Maluku, 141 km southwest of Kiamana, Papua Province, 256 km southeast of Fakfak, West Papua Province, 280 km southwest of Nabire, Papua, and 334 km of Keawkwa, Papua. The earthquake did not have potential to cause a subsequent tsunami. Indonesia is prone to seismic upheavals due to its location on the so-called Pacific "Ring of Fire", an area of volcanoes and fault lines encircling the Pacific Basin. The most powerful and devastating one hitting the country was an 8.9 magnitude earthquake, triggering massive tsunami which claimed more than 200,000 lives in Aceh province on December 26, 2004.
