An earthquake measuring 6.4 hit Indonesia's Lombok tourist island on Sunday, killing 14 people and injuring about 162, and damaging thousands of homes.

Among the people killed in the quake - at least a few - were five children. Electricity was cut off in the worst-affected areas on the northern side of the island. Villagers rushed to open fields to avoid collapsing buildings.

A spokesman for the disaster relief agency Sotobo Boro Nogroho said the area was temporarily closed to climbers heading for the slopes of Mount Ringani on the northern side of the island because of reports of possible landslides.

Hundreds of climbers were being evacuated from the Ringani National Park, and 115 of them had already been safely escorted out of the area, he said.

An emergency tent was set up to treat the injured because the local hospital was hit in the quake, while those in critical condition were transferred to other hospitals.

Footage showed a number of ambulances lined up in the streets of Lombok and a number of destroyed houses, with few left.

Earthquakes are frequent in Indonesia, which is located in a seismically active zone within the "belt of fire" surrounding the Pacific coast.