Singapore/Sidoarjo : Patima was pottering at home in the Indonesian town of Sidoarjo on Monday when at about 3pm she felt a “big shake”.

It was not an earthquake, for she is familiar with these. Something sounded like it had crashed, she said.

Relatives gather outside the school on Wednesday. Credit: AP

Then, from next door, came a scream on repeat – “The boarding house has collapsed!” In the distance, the wails of ambulances.

The boarding house is Al Khoziny, an Islamic school in Sidoarjo, about 20 kilometres south of central Surabaya. It is one of the oldest and most respected of its kind in East Java.

Patima’s 18-year-old son Moch Defa Sahrifudin had boarded there, walking distance from home, for three years.

“I immediately rushed to the school,” she told this masthead. “St

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