The Indonesian city of Palu was slammed by waves from a tsunami set off by an earthquake.
Indonesia has been hit by tsunami after a powerful 7.5 magnitude earthquake had rocked earlier. Many buildings had collapsed in the aftermath of the huge tremor.
Among the country's other big earthquakes, a 6.3-magnitude quake in 2006 rocked a densely populated region of Java near the city of Yogyakarta, killing around 6,000 people and injuring 38,000. More than 420,000 people were left homeless and some 157,000 houses were destroyed. A year earlier, in 2005, a quake measuring 8.7 magnitude struck off the coast of Sumatra, which is particularly prone to quakes, killing 900 people and injuring 6,000.
Here are the Highlights on Indonesia Earthquake:
Some people took to Twitter saying they could not contact loved ones. "My family in Palu is unreachable," Twitter user @noyvionella said.
National Disaster Mitigation Agency spokesman Sutopo Purwo Nugroho said communications had been cut both in the city of Palu and the nearby fishing town of Donggala, closest to the epicentre of the quake 80 km (50 miles) away.
According to AFP reports, Facebook Live video showed long traffic jams formed in some parts of the region as terrified residents packed into cars, trucks and motorbikes to flee to higher ground following the tsunami warning.
Indonesia is one of the most disaster-prone nations on earth. The Southeast Asian archipelago nation lies on the Pacific "Ring of Fire", where tectonic plates collide and many of the world's volcanic eruptions and earthquakes occur.
"A tsunami has happened in Palu," said Rahmat Triyono, head of the disaster agency's earthquake and tsunami division, referring to the city of 350,000 nearly 80 kilometres (50 miles) from the quake's epicentre.
Amateur footage shows huge wave crashing into an Indonesian city of Palu.