Indonesia says volcanic tsunami drove 40,000 from their homes

Number of displaced doubles and those injured rises to 7,000, but death toll drops to 426

An artificial rose is seen on the floor outside a collapsed home in Rajabasa in Lampung. AFP

A cars sits among debris in Tanjung Lesung. EPA

A boy covers his face as he stands outside a collapsed house in Rajabasa. AFP

Fishermen in Teluk village tend to their damaged boats. AFP

Traditional fishing boats are seen damaged in Teluk village. AFP

A woman walks amid debris in Sumur. AP Photo

A man inspects his damanged house in Sumur. AP Photo

People inspect damaged in Sumur. AP Photo

Soldiers inspect the damage in Sumur. AP Photo

A woman retrieves clothing from a damaged building in Rajabasa. AFP

Residents ride in a truck near an area of collapsed houses in Rajabasa. AFP

A soldier searches for victims in Sumur. AP Photo

Members of an Indonesian search and rescue team carry the body of a victim, retrieved from a collapsed home, in a body bag in Rajabasa. AFP

A survivor walks inside a vavaged house in Sumur. AP Photo

A girl stands among debris in Tanjung Lesung. EPA

Marines search for victims at a beach in Sumur. AP Photo

The number of people evacuated after Indonesia's deadly tsunami has nearly doubled to about 40,000 while more than 7,000 were injured in the disaster, officials said on Friday, as they trimmed the official death toll.

Authorities said 426 people had been killed - down from a previous tally of 430. Double-counting by different districts was blamed for the change. Two dozen people remain missing almost a week after the disaster.

The fresh figures come a day after Indonesia's disaster agency raised the danger alert level for an erupting volcano that sparked the killer tsunami at the weekend.

They have also warned that fresh activity at the crater threatened to trigger another deadly wave.

Previously, the number of displaced - including many left homeless - stood at 22,0000 but that figure has now jumped to just over 40,000, according to the latest tally.

Some 7,202 people suffered injuries, jumping from 1,495, while nearly 1,300 homes were destroyed as the waves crashed into the coastlines of western Java island and south Sumatra, authorities said.

"We're recommending that people who lived near the beach be permanently relocated," national disaster agency spokesman Sutopo Purwo Nugroho told a press briefing in Jakarta.

"But it's a last-ditch option because it's not easy with limited space and people reluctant to move away."

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A no-go zone around rumbling Anak Krakatoa has been widened to five kilometres - up from a previous 2km - with residents warned to stay away from the coast.

The crater's status has been raised to high alert, the second-highest warning on Indonesia four-point danger scale.

Flights are being redirected away from the area.

A section of the crater - which emerged at the site of the Krakatoa volcano, whose massive 1883 eruption killed at least 36,000 people - collapsed after an eruption and slid into the ocean, triggering Saturday night's killer wave.

Before and after satellite images taken by Japan's space agency showed that a two-square-kilometre chunk of the volcanic island had collapsed into the water.

Indonesia, a vast South-East Asian archipelago, is one of the most disaster-hit nations on Earth due to its position straddling the so-called Pacific Ring of Fire, where tectonic plates collide.

The tsunami was Indonesia's third major natural disaster in six months, following a series of powerful earthquakes on the island of Lombok in July and August and a quake-tsunami in September that killed about 2,200 people in Palu on Sulawesi island, with thousands more missing and presumed dead.