A few hours ago a magnitude 7.7 earthquake slammed the Flores region in Indonesia. Buildings damaged, power outages, hospital patients evacuated, people dead. The usual ugly checklist.

Labuan Bajo – the gateway to Komodo – took hits. Hotels damaged, tourists scrambling, the whole fragile machine that keeps this place running suddenly looking very temporary.

This area lives and dies on dragon tourism. Diving boats, kite schools, island-hopping operators, the guy selling wooden Komodo carvings, the small air and ferry connections, even the conservation fees that help keep the park going. One solid shake and the cancellations start rolling in before the aftershocks have even finished.

I wrote about the first two disasters not long ago. First a typhoon, then an earthquake – what’s the third? Apparently we didn’t have to wait long.

The digital aftershock is faster than the real one

In the old days you had a few days of uncertainty. Now the photos are up, the travel alerts are updated, and the booking engines are already reflecting the risk. The U.S. has already flagged the situation. The chain is brutal and short: damage → inspections and temporary closures → cancelled bookings → local economy takes another body blow.

Komodo isn’t Bali. It’s more specialized, more dependent, and less able to absorb a hit like this without real pain.

Nature doesn’t care about our travel plans or our carefully curated Instagram feeds. It just keeps scoring points.

What do you think – is this the third one, or are we still counting?