Some 10,000 rescuers toiled on what would have been the final day of searching the ruins of the seaside city of Palu, hit on Sept. 28 by the double disaster, as relatives hoped their loved ones could be found and given a proper burial.
But a spokesman for the disaster agency told a briefing in Jakarta the search would go on until Friday evening.
The official death toll was raised to 2,073. No one knows how many people have yet to be found in Palu’s ruined neighborhoods but it could be as many as 5,000, the disaster agency says.
If any reminder were needed of Indonesia’s treacherous tectonics, a magnitude 6 quake struck off Java and Bali islands early on Thursday, killing three people in Java, damaging buildings and sparking panic.
The annual meetings of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank are being held this week on Bali and attended by more than 19,000 delegates and other guests, including ministers, central bank heads and some country leaders.
The government has said it needs to call off the search for bodies because of concern about the spread of disease, and begin to focus on the next phase - rebuilding.
Rehabilitation and reconstruction will take until 2021, the government says.
Data on the destruction is being compiled and mapping done to help determine where new houses should be built.
