At least 384 people have been killed and more than 500 injured after a 7.5-magnitude earthquake and subsequent tsunami rocked the Indonesian island of Sulawesi on Friday, the country's disaster agency has confirmed. At least 29 people are considered missing.
Thousands of buildings were destroyed by the quake, which was centered about 48 miles north of the city of Palu, according to the Geological Survey.
“We have found corpses from the earthquake as well as bodies swept up by the tsunami,” said Indonesia’s disaster agency spokesman Sutopo Purwo Nugroho on Saturday.
The waves reached as high as six meters (18 feet), he added, saying some people were able to save themselves by climbing tall trees.
The death toll from the disasters is expected to rise, Nugroho continued.
Preparations for a beach festival were being made in Palu when waves struck, houses had been swept away and families remain missing.
Indonesia sits on the Pacific Ring of Fire and is regularly hit by earthquakes. Friday's tremors came weeks after 460 people were killed following an earthquake on the Indonesian island of Lombok, destroying tens of thousands of buildings and displacing over 400,000 people.