Quakes kill at least three on Indonesian island

JAKARTA (Reuters) - At least three people were killed and 45 injured when powerful earthquakes struck off the coast of Sumbawa island in central Indonesia, a health ministry official said on Monday.

Several buildings, including a health clinic, collapsed in the island's Bima district, said Rustam Pakaya, the head of the health ministry's crisis centre.

"The casualties are likely to increase and we are still assessing the situation," Pakaya told Reuters.

The quakes affected the eastern side of Sumbawa island, a rugged volcanic island that gets fewer tourists than neighboring Lombok and Bali.

The first quake of magnitude 6.7 struck 30 miles northwest of Raba in Sumbawa just after midnight, an official at the country's meterology agency said.

A second quake of 6.8 struck about four hours later in the same area, triggering a brief tsunami warning, the official added.

The U.S. Pacific Tsunami Warning Center also said the quake could have produced a local tsunami no more than 100 km from the earthquake's epicenter.

The U.S. geological survey put the second quake at magnitude 6.3.

An earthquake measuring 6.0 also struck off the coast of Sumatra island in the early hours of Monday, some 100 km (60 miles) southwest of Mukomuko in Bengkulu, the local meteorology agency said. There was no tsunami warning.