Rescue teams in Indonesia after still discovering survivors some 40 hours after a catastrophic earthquake struck the country.

The earthquake on the Indonesian island of Sumatra, which reached a magnitude of 7.6, has already claimed the lives of more than 1,100 people, according to the United Nations (UN).

Teams of rescue workers are being rushed to the island in a bid to respond to the natural disaster, which has left thousands trapped under rubble.

"These numbers, I fear, will rise as more info becomes available," John Holmes, under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs at the UN, told reporters in New York on Thursday.

"The Indonesian government’s announcement of a two-month emergency phase is an indication of the severity of this crisis."

The earthquake struck close to the city of Padang, bringing buildings including hospitals and schools crashing to the ground.

Padang is the capital of Indonesia’s West Sumatra province, and sits on one of the world’s most active fault lines along the "Ring of Fire", renowned for generating earthquakes where the Into-Australia plate grinds against the Eurasia plate to create earth tremors.

The same fault line caused the 2004 earthquake that generated a tsunami which killed thousands of people.

A UN team – comprising members from the World Health Organization (WHO), the UN children’s fund (UNICEF) and others – has arrived in the city of Padang, which has a population of nearly one million.

"When nature strikes with such force, the world must come together," Josette Sheeran, executive director of the World Food Programme (WFP), said in a statement.

Last reports said nine children had been found alive in the rubble of a school, but eight were pulled out dead.

Australia’s foreign minister Stephen Smith said that up to 100 Australians were unaccounted for after the quake, although there was no evidence so far that any had been killed or injured. He added that Australia would be offering aid and support to Sumatra.

US president Barack Obama, who spent part of his childhood in Indonesia, also pledged to support the recovery effort.

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