Bologna, August 16, 2026 – There were moments of great fear and anguish, but the thirteen tourists from Bologna who were stranded on the Indonesian island of Flores – hit by an earthquake with magnitude 7.7 – managed to leave the island, although not yet to return home.
Late in the morning they boarded a flight to Bali
Late in the morning, Italian time, they boarded a flight to Bali, where the situation is reportedly calmer. From the Denpasar airport in Bali, they should then more easily be able to find another flight that takes them to Italy, although the timing is not yet clear.
The vacation turned into a moment of fear and anguish: “We felt the tremors on the boat”
What the group experienced is a true ordeal, which began on the night between Friday and Saturday when the group, with children in tow, was sailing on a short cruise in the Komodo archipelago. The first tremors were felt by the group at dawn, even though the earthquake’s epicenter was about seventy kilometers away from where the 13 people from Bologna were anchored: “We felt the tremors on the boat”, they recounted. The group immediately reached the nearest port to move away from the coast, given the tsunami alert promptly issued by the authorities in Jakarta.
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None of the 13 from Bologna were injured
Fortunately, none of the 13 people from Bologna who were on the island of Flores at the time of the terrible earthquake, which caused over 50 deaths, were injured. For them, only a huge scare and constant contact with the Italian embassy and the Farnesina, working to enable their most immediate repatriation from Indonesia.
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