Another strong earthquake hit Tuesday morning, local time, in the same area of the Indian Ocean where two giant quakes have struck since last December.
The latest quake registered magnitude 6.4 on the Richter scale, according to preliminary data from the U.S. National Earthquake Information Center.
Hundreds of aftershocks, more than a dozen of them significant, have struck near northwestern Sumatra since a major quake there occurred March 28. That event, registering magnitude 8.7, occurred under the seafloor, but killed several thousand people on nearby islands and marked the third major quake to hit the area in three months.
The latest temblor hit several hundred miles to the southeast of the main quake area.
Earthquakes registering magnitude 6 or greater are capable of causing significant damage.
The cycle of tremors has continued with few respites since Dec. 26, when the area was hit with a magnitude 9 quake, the fourth-largest ever recorded. It generated ocean tsunamis that killed more than 300,000 people in South Asia and East Africa and rendered more than 1 million homeless.
Since the December event, the NEIC has detected more than 1,000 subsequent earthquakes and significant aftershocks in the area.
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