Maybe Up To 6000 Dead, Tidal Waves Slams Thailand

[Darknight]

Reporters' log: Asia disaster

As aid efforts get under way in response to the Asian quake disaster, the BBC's correspondents report from affected areas around the region.

Wednesday 29th December

Roland Buerk: Galle, Sri Lanka: 0545 GMT

Every day more desperate people are arriving in Galle. They are walking up the coast from resorts and villages devastated by the tsunami. Many have nothing and they are finding little here. Distribution points have been set up, but there has been hardly any food and water to hand out.

With the first reports of diarrhoea outbreaks now coming back from some of the camps, the need for a structured response is particularly pressing.

Matthew Grant: Tamil Nadu coast, India : 0540 GMT

Along this coastline there are now hundreds of makeshift relief camps. While aid is reaching many, the big problem is it is not being distributed evenly. In the easy-to-reach areas, villages are being deluged with handouts, but in the more remote parts many still lack basics such as safe drinking-water.

Plane-loads of supplies are beginning to arrive in Sri Lanka. But it will be a massive logistical operation to get aid to the worst-hit areas and people here have little time.

Chris Hogg : Phuket, Thailand : 0230 GMT

For the first couple of days the relief effort here was focused on search and rescue. Now, though, the authorities need to extend their operations to meet the needs of those who survived, according to the United Nations children's agency, Unicef.

Many children were separated from their parents when the wave struck. Phuket hospital has been posting pictures of some of them on the internet in an attempt to find their families. It's drawn dozens of people and local people to the hospital, desperate to be reunited with their loved ones.

[chuchok]

Looters

People be carefull in your comments and avoid to transform this tragedy in one more of our complains about Thailand and Thia people.

In a situation in where so many people, specially wealthy tourist, lost or left so many valuables it should be expected that somebody will want to collect them.

For sure many valuables are spread all around.

Looters will be unavoidable, as in any disaster in a westernn country, but the danger is to assume that whoever pick up something is a looter.

The bottom line is that spirit of the Thai people in general,as of the westerners, is the one of sorrow and genuine desire to help in this tragedy.

Lets concentrate in the goodness and how we can help.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Agree with you,but good news or bad news people want to hear about it. I certainly want the big picture. This certainly does not involve slagging off Thais though.

[Horizontalbiker]

OK how can we help. Have tried getting in touch with Brit. embassy but to no avail. I here people are being put up in uni. dorms. I think a friendly home environment would be more helpful, and less stressful. Am willing to open my home to these people but don't know how. Any suggestions.

At this time I think we ex-pats should try to help so if you have a spare room, please try to put it to good use.

[Darknight]

Eye witness accounts (thailand only)

From the BBC website

I was so lucky to have survived - the woman who had a souvenir shop underneath my hotel escaped with me. The wave took everything of hers away: her shop as well as her house, everything. Yet, she was still offering me whatever cash she had in her pocket to make sure that I get home safely. I mean, despite the fact that she had nothing, she still wanted to give everything that she had. So please, give generously because a lot of people have absolutely nothing other than what they are wearing.

Vicky Wong, Phuket

My beautiful sister Lisa died when the tsunami hit the tiny Koh Phra Thong island in Thailand. She was a conservationist, and had dedicated her short life to helping wildlife and the environment, she was 31. Her brother Mark and I and our family are absolutely dumbstruck. She will leave a massive hole in the lives of everyone who knew and loved her. We miss her terribly already, the world was a better place with her in it. The island has been evacuated, she was one of three casualties. However her body is still on the island, I've heard nothing from the foreign office, the makeshift British embassy in Phuket is trying to help but is snowed under. I want her body recovered but I feel useless so far away...

Chris Jones, Windsor, UK

We were staying right on the beach at Ko Lak, Phuket. At breakfast we looked out to sea and commented that we could see "surf" and that we might be able to have a surf. We walked out to the beach commenting on how far out the tide was, the next minute whistles were being blown and we were being shouted at to get off the beach. We managed to run to our two-storey building and get to the highest point - this saved our lives as everything around us was crushed, we smashed our way onto the roof top and stayed there for about an hour.

We were incredibly lucky, we have only the clothes we are standing in, but at least we have each other. People around us have terrible injuries or have lost their wives, husbands or children. The man staying in front of us has lost his wife, daughter and grand-daughter, it is all so sad. Please send what you can to help those left behind.

Julia Pollard, London, UK

At 0800 my bed shook for about 2 mins. The curtains were shaking. There was an earthquake somewhere. Nothing unusual, I thought, and dozed on. Then I heard on BBC radio that there'd been a big quake off North Sumatra. How STUPID not to consider the consequences. I was due to go canoeing but was late. Just about to leave home, my neighbours started screaming. I live 10m from the sea wall at Chalong. I went outside to see the water at the top of the wall, surging along at about 10 knots, boiling brown with breaking wooden boats (longtails) like soup. Two mins later the boats were going the other way, just as fast. The sea dried up in 10 mins, sucked out. Oops, what goes out fast must come back fast. It was time to grab some gear & seek higher ground. I was lucky. The relative shelter of Chalong & my crumbling sea wall saved me & my house. Those on the west coast weren't so lucky, including my good friend who hadn't heard a second wave was coming. She was taking care of house guests at her idyllic beachside cottage - mopping up - when it hit.

Peter, Phuket, Thailand

We are very lucky to have survived. We left Patong for a boat trip at 07.30 to Phang Nga. Boat but the trip aborted early to avoid the tidal wave. The boat to Phi Phi we were on 2 days earlier was sunk. We were on Phi Phi 2 days earlier and now we believe many people have died there. We have been unable to return to Patong last night so we slept in emergency accommodation and heard many horror stories from evacuees whose family members are missing. There were stories of severed limbs from flying glass, narrow escapes from drowning and people literally outrunning the tidal wave from the beach to escape. The Thai people have been magnificent, providing free food and drink and accommodation very quickly for us. Today Patong town is a disaster zone. All businesses within 500 metres of the beach are destroyed, cars are smashed, power lines are down, many thousands of people will have no work for some time to come. Bodies are still being recovered. We saw vehicles taking bodies to the hospitals or mortuaries but the clean up operation will start soon. Right now, everyone is in fear of a second wave or aftershock, and rumours have led to panic at least 2 times today.

Malcolm Tetley and James Spooner, Patong Thailand

[onethailand]

I think a friendly home environment would be more helpful, and less stressful.

Nice thought - but I think the impracticality of something like this would outweigh the advantages, because most of these people have no identification papers, may need medical treatment or counseling, etc. It is more sensible for the authorities to try to keep everyone in a few specific locations so as best to help them.

A better idea might be to set up your home as a collection point for donations from neighbors, friends, etc... and then contact one of the relevant agencies for pick-up.

[Tompa]

If you're in Bangkok and want to help you can contact the British Club on Silom Soi 18. They are collecting aids for the people that are being transported up to Bangkok.

[Tompa]

Sorry, forgot to add the phone number to the British Club

02 234 0247

[Horizontalbiker]

A better idea might be to set up your home as a collection point for donations from neighbors, friends, etc... and then contact one of the relevant agencies for pick-up.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Good thinking batman. Done.

[Darknight]

Asia earthquake toll still rising

From BBC news

Health experts fear disease could double the death toll

The death toll from the undersea quake in southern Asia is continuing to rise relentlessly as relief teams reach outlying towns and more bodies wash up.

The known toll stands above 50,000 but estimates suggest thousands more are dead, many of them children.

Two US warships carrying some 15,000 soldiers and cargo aircraft with supplies are en route to the region, as part of a massive global relief effort.

The UN has warned disease could double the death toll from Sunday's quake.

The 9.0 magnitude earthquake happened just off the coast of the large Indonesian island of Sumatra, and set off huge waves that reached as far as Africa.

Indonesia, Sri Lanka, India and Thailand are among the countries worst hit.

Across the afflicted region, searches are continuing to uncover bodies from beaches and collapsed buildings.

CONFIRMED DEATH TOLL

Sri Lanka: 18,706 dead

Indonesia: 27,174 dead

India: 4,371 dead

Thailand: 1,516 dead

Maldives: 52 dead

Malaysia: 44 dead

Burma: 30 dead

Bangladesh: 2 dead

Somalia: 100 dead

Kenya: 1 dead

Seychelles: 3 dead

Tanzania: 10 dead

In India, Indonesia and Sri Lanka, bodies are being buried as quickly as possible in mass graves, and hospitals and aid agencies are scrambling to cope.

In several of those nations, some outlying towns and villages have not yet even been reached.

But as rescue workers discover more bodies, the true extent of the tsunami's devastation is becoming clearer:

The official Indonesian death toll stands at 27,174 - but the vice-president estimated the real tally was 30,000 to 40,000. Officials have estimated the inundated Sumatran town of Meulaboh may have lost 10,000 inhabitants - about 10% of its population

Parliamentary elections in the Maldives, scheduled for Friday, are postponed, as a government official warns the cost of damage could exceed the island nation's annual GDP

About 7,000 people are feared dead in the low-lying Andaman and Nicobar islands, say Indian officials, with 20% of the population on one island, Car Nicobar, believed killed

The bodies of more than 700 mainly foreign tourists have been found in the Thai resort of Khao Lak - the government says the death toll in Thailand may rise to 2,000

Unicef warns that children could account for up to a third of the dead.

But there have been some stories of survival against the odds. A four-year-old boy was reunited with his parents in Thailand after a giant wave left him stranded in a tree for two days without food or water, Reuters news agency reported.

Aid challenge

The UN has said it faces an unprecedented challenge in co-ordinating distribution of aid to some 10 nations at once.

The worst-affected countries have been overwhelmed by the scale of the disaster - a disaster compounded because infrastructure was also knocked out.

Disease 'could swamp zones'

In Geneva, World Health Organization (WHO) expert David Nabarro has warned "there is certainly a chance that we could have as many dying from communicable diseases as from the tsunami".

US cargo aircraft are among hundreds of planes expected to arrive in the next few days.

The US has more than doubled its aid pledge to $35m but denies this is in response to remarks from the UN emergency relief co-ordinator Jan Egeland that rich nations were "stingy" in pledging relief funds.

Coastal communities across South Asia - and more than 4,000 km away in Africa - were swept away and homes engulfed by waves up to 10m high after the quake created a tsunami that sped across the ocean.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/4131437.stm

[Darknight]

Thai dead include 473 foreigners

From BBC NEWS

Luxury hotels in Khao Lak were left in ruins

The death toll in Thailand from Sunday's earthquake-inspired sea surges now includes 473 foreigners, mainly tourists, authorities have said.

More than 1,500 people are confirmed dead, but the number is still rising as rescuers reach more remote resorts.

Officials said more than 1,400 people were still missing, and many were thought to be foreign tourists.

A total of 360 people - 261 guests and 99 employees - are missing from the French-owned Sofitel in Khao Lak.

The resort, north of the island of Phuket, was one of the worst hit. Several luxury hotels, which were full for the Christmas holiday season, are now in ruins.

The Sofitel Magic Lagoon in Khao Lak had 424 guests registered and 320 staff when the sea surge, also known as a Tsunami, hit.

Jean-Marc Espalioux, chairman of the company owning the hotel, said hope was running out of finding survivors.

"We have little hope, except for individual miracles," he told the AFP news agency.

Thailand's Department of Disaster Prevention and Mitigation released a list of foreigners confirmed dead on Wednesday.

The countries which saw the heaviest losses included Sweden, with 54 victims, Germany with 49 and Britain with 43, the department said.

Britain's Foreign Office has so far confirmed only 18 deaths, 12 of which were in Thailand.

Speaking earlier, Sweden's foreign minister said over 1,000 Swedish nationals were still missing, mainly in Thailand, and she feared many would not be found.

Rescuers and relief officials continued the grim task of finding and identifying bodies.

Officials complained there were few facilities for keeping the hundreds of dead bodies refrigerated, and many are rotting rapidly, making identification more difficult.

Locals and tourists are inspecting the dead for loved ones, or looking at message boards posted with photos of the dead.

Hope amid the wreckage

Amid the horror there were stories of amazing survival.

A six-year-old girl from Taiwan, Yeh Chia-ni, on holiday with her parents on Phi Phi island off the coast of Phuket, clung to a coconut tree for more than 20 hours to escape the deadly waves.

Her mother was listed as missing.

International aid has started arriving in Phuket, with supplies from France and Australia being the first to arrive.

Looting has also been reported in parts of Phuket and Phi Phi.

Thailand's Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra described the thieves as "despicable".

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/4131527.stm

[Darknight]

Tsunami among world's worst disasters

From BBC NEWS

Hurricanes occur annually, but some are worse than others

The massive sea surge in Asia has been described by relief experts as one of the worst natural disasters in recent history.

With a magnitude of 9.0, the undersea quake off the coast of Sumatra is the worst for 40 years and the fourth strongest since 1900.

It is also notable for the extent of its reach - killing tens of thousands of people, from Malaysia in the east to the African coast in the west.

As the number of dead continues to rise, this tsunami may well earn itself a grim place in the record books.

According to the Guinness Book of Records, the highest death toll from a tsunami until now happened in 1896, when 27,000 people were drowned following an earthquake off the coast of Japan.

But while natural catastrophes of this size are thankfully not frequent, they are deadly - wiping out whole communities and leaving billions of dollars' worth of damage behind.

One of the most memorable disasters of recent times is Hurricane Mitch, which devastated much of Honduras and Nicaragua in Central America in 1998.

More than 10,000 people were estimated to have been killed and some two million left homeless as the torrential rain caused mudslides that swept away whole villages.

Bangladesh was even harder hit in 1970, when a cyclone killed up to 500,000 people. Winds of up to 230 km/h whipped up massive waves that took away entire villages.

China suffered similar losses when an earthquake with a magnitude of 8.3 almost obliterated the north-eastern city of Tangshan in 1976. The official number of people killed was put at around 250,000, although some said the figure was more like 750,000.

And almost exactly a year ago, a 6.3 quake devastated the Iranian city of Bam, killing more than 50,000.

China, and indeed Asia as a whole, has had its fair share of natural disasters over the centuries.

Whole communities are left devastated by natural disasters

Shanxi and Henan provinces lost more than 800,000 people when they were hit, in 1556, by one of the worst earthquakes in history.

In 1887, about 900,000 people died when the country's Yellow River burst its banks in the worst-ever recorded flooding.

A volcanic eruption of Mount Tambora on Indonesia's Sumbawa island in 1815 claimed the lives of more than 90,000 people as a blanket of lava and ash covered all around it, leading to agricultural devastation, famine and disease.

And one of the worst monsoons in living memory claimed the lives of 10,000 people in Thailand over the course of three months in 1983. Some 100,000 people contracted waterborne diseases as a result of the storm.

Snow storms, forest fires and avalanches have all proved deadly. A single landslide in Peru in 1970 killed more than 18,000 people in the town of Yungay.

Most of these disasters were isolated to one area or one country. But, as the Asian tsunami has shown, nature knows no borders.

The droughts that swept across sub-Saharan African in the 1980s led to the starvation of an estimated one million people. They are threatening to do the same again.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/4128509.stm

[Darknight]

CONFIRMED DEATH TOLL Updated

From BBC News

A TOTAL OF 60672 People Have Died and the figure is still rising.

Sri Lanka: 21,715 dead

Indonesia: 32,828

India: 4,371 dead

Thailand: 1,516 dead

Maldives: 52 dead

Malaysia: 44 dead

Burma: 30 dead

Bangladesh: 2 dead

Somalia: 100 dead

Kenya: 1 dead

Seychelles: 3 dead

Tanzania: 10 dead

[Darknight]

Realisation hits for UK survivors

By Tim Fawcett

BBC News, Phuket

As the sheer scale of the destruction and devastation becomes more apparent, British survivors in Phuket and surrounding islands are realising how close they came to death.

Survivors staying on the islands of Phi Phi even more so.

Early reports implied Phi Phi, with its low-lying, fragile accommodation and exposure to open sea, would have little protection from the tsunami.

In larger neighbour Phuket, there were fears that everyone in Phi Phi would be killed.

Clive, on a £2,500 package deal from England to Phi Phi and Koh Samui, had an experience which sounded more like something out of a disaster movie than a holiday.

He was staying in a beach bungalow in Phi Phi, constructed from bamboo and other local materials.

Down on the beach at the time of the approaching wave he ran for his life.

"It was a huge wall of water," he said.

The bungalow he was staying in had a second level from which he was forced to watch the deathly scene unfold below.

"The worst thing was seeing people smashed against rocks and obstructions," he said.

"Many were dragged out to sea - shattered glass was cutting people to shreds as they tried in vain to grab just anything that floated."

'Half-trashed'

Clive, like many others, clambered desperately up a mountain to safety. More than a thousand people slept the night in the open on a steep slope of jungle.

"We were bitten by mosquitoes all night," he said.

The next morning, as light returned, those that survived could see the Phi Phi islands were half-trashed.

It was not a total wipe-out so there was hope of more survivors.

Clive spent the whole day pulling bodies from the sea.

More sickening were the desperate groans and spluttering from people trapped under wrecked buildings. Many perished.

The region is popular with yachtsmen and women, many from Europe.

If boats had been some way out to sea at the time of the giant wave, they might have been lucky and able to ride it out, Clive says.

"Otherwise you were thrown at the coastline like a small toy," he said.

Later he managed to save some young children clasping onto debris. They were in total shock.

Less lucky was a British family in Phuket island itself.

They live as expats and their house was in Patong.

Their six-year-old child was washed away in the torrents right in front of their eyes.

Refugee camp

A refugee camp was set up in Phuket Town and that's where many of the Phi Phi island survivors ended up.

They said ferries had got them off the island. Many had to wait while the worst injured were picked up first, some by helicopter.

I was in disbelief - not fear - not knowing what had caused this huge torrent carrying with it cars and people

Another British survivor, David East, an expatriate who lives in Singapore was staying in Kamala, the next resort north from Patong.

"I've never seen so much water.

"It had travelled over a quarter of a mile overland before it reached the street where I was staying - a room on the first floor of a concrete constructed house," he said.

"I was in disbelief - not fear - not knowing what had caused this huge torrent carrying with it cars and people.

"I survived because I was up there," he said pointing.

"Not down there."

'Lovely Christmas'

In the room below, David showed me the remains of a wardrobe smashed to pieces and glass from the front window shattered everywhere .

"A Russian was in there but I think he escaped having got up early to go out.

"He would have been killed if, like me, he had been in bed sleeping off what was a lovely Christmas night on the beach."

That same beach where the sound of the gentle waves had been complementing a delightful seasonal atmosphere has disappeared, leaving no sign of the bars and restaurants that once stood there.

How many were taking an early swim or sun bathing on that fateful morning in Kamala is anyone's guess. But at the same time the previous day David saw at least a few hundred people on the beach.

'So confusing'

David continued his tale as we trod carefully over the rubble-strewn street.

I can't believe how lucky we were, considering most mornings I was on that beach

"We just wanted to get away and had to wait for the worst of the water to recede which took over an hour.

"I can't believe how lucky we were, considering most mornings I was on that beach.

"There was so much disinformation, thinking another onslaught was coming when it wasn't and the panic."

David feels deep sorrow for the Thai people he had befriended from previous visits to Kamala.

"They have nothing left - their livelihoods, some their families.

"It's alright for me, I can just walk away and get on a plane."

Remarkable escape

Like so many survivors here David is leaving Phuket.

Many are flying to Bangkok. Some, like Clive, are continuing their holiday in the unaffected area of the Gulf of Thailand.

Further up the coast in Surin, one of Phuket's developed areas, the beach and its infrastructure made a remarkable escape.

Perhaps the topography had steered the wave out of the way.

Unbearable scale

One British couple, with their baby, were having a quiet meal last night trying their best to forget the whole thing.

They had not been hurt but many of their friends from England who live here have not been seen since the disaster struck.

"We don't know if they are alive or not," said the husband, who did not want to be named.

The sense of the unbearable scale of the tragedy is beginning to sink in here.

After more than three days of shock, and people's attempts to save their own lives and those of others, the full horror is unfolding.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4131513.stm

[bina]

thanx for the sites in thai; appreciated by the workers here ; even in all this disaster, politics rule: israeli search and identification teams (we have expertise in this unfortunately) were sent to all areas including sri lanka-- the sri lankins denied the help.and turned them back.....

be strong

bina

[ferd54]

Is there any way that we can stop posting news reports that we all already know? It's buring up bandwidth, pages and server time. Let the people who have first-hand accounts be known...it's getting more and more difficult to scroll through all the redundant posts. We are all computer-savy (or else we wouldn't even be in this forum); we can find out by ourselves what the BBC or CNN or Reuters had to say.

Let the unique information come through and not be buried under "copy and paste".

[Boon Mee]

Is there any way that we can stop posting news reports that we all already know? It's buring up bandwidth, pages and server time. Let the people who have first-hand accounts be known...it's getting more and more difficult to scroll through all the redundant posts. We are all computer-savy (or else we wouldn't even be in this forum); we can find out by ourselves what the BBC or CNN or Reuters had to say.

Let the unique information come through and not be buried under "copy and paste".

Hear hear!

A lot less time consuming...

[Darknight]

Reuters reports Asia Tsunami Death Toll as high as 69,242

SINGAPORE (Reuters) - The death toll from the Asian tsunami, triggered by a magnitude 9.0 earthquake off Indonesia, rose to 69,242 people, government and health officials said.

Indonesia, Sri Lanka and India were among the hardest hit.

All figures are preliminary:

Bangladesh 2

East Africa 133*

India 12,419**

Indonesia 32,502 injured up to 100,000

Malaysia 64 injured 218

Maldives 55

Myanmar 36 injured 45

Sri Lanka 22,493

Thailand 1,538 injured 8,950

TOTAL

69,242

* The tsunami killed people as far away as East Africa. This figure includes Kenya, Seychelles, Somalia and Tanzania.

** The figure includes an estimated 7,000 confirmed or presumed killed in India's Andaman and Nicobar islands.

Numbers based on government and health officials.

Numbers of injured were not available for all countries affected, but are expected to exceed the number of dead.

http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?t...94&pageNumber=2

[Tornado]

Thailands death toll will rise to at least double. There is 1 thousand dead in Phang Nga alone. Expect it to rise to at least 3 to 4 thousand.

[Darknight]

Is there any way that we can stop posting news reports that we all already know? It's buring up bandwidth, pages and server time. Let the people who have first-hand accounts be known...it's getting more and more difficult to scroll through all the redundant posts. We are all computer-savy (or else we wouldn't even be in this forum); we can find out by ourselves what the BBC or CNN or Reuters had to say.

Let the unique information come through and not be buried under "copy and paste".

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

This Thread is a breaking news thread to gather happening news about the thailand disaster.

If you have a unique story to tell or have a discussion, please feel free to Post it in a seperate topic.

Many people are not that savy and only have or want acces to the thaivisa portal regarding the disaster. Much information regarding loved ones wouldn't be available if it wasn't for copy and paste. It helps to get the most information out as possible, people have been found and connected to their loved ones through forums.

Besides this has been discussed before and decided upon by the Admins.

Thanks for your intrest

Darknight.

[Darknight]

Up to 50 Britons Feared Dead in Asian Tsunami

Reuters reports

LONDON (Reuters) - Up to 50 Britons were feared dead Wednesday in the massive Asian tsunami after Thai authorities sharply raised the number of UK nationals killed in the country's devastated tourist resorts to 43.

A Foreign Office spokeswoman said she could only confirm a rise in the official death toll to 20 -- 14 dead in Thailand, three in the Maldives and three in Sri Lanka.

But she said the number was expected to rise.

Thousands of British tourists were vacationing in coastal resorts around the Indian Ocean Sunday when a giant wave triggered by an underwater earthquake swamped the region, killing nearly 70,000 people.

The British government Wednesday pledged 15 million pounds to help the devastated area.

http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?t...storyID=7198526

[amarka]

Up to 50 Britons Feared Dead in Asian Tsunami

Reuters reports

LONDON (Reuters) - Up to 50 Britons were feared dead Wednesday in the massive Asian tsunami after Thai authorities sharply raised the number of UK nationals killed in the country's devastated tourist resorts to 43.

A Foreign Office spokeswoman said she could only confirm a rise in the official death toll to 20 -- 14 dead in Thailand, three in the Maldives and three in Sri Lanka.

But she said the number was expected to rise.

Thousands of British tourists were vacationing in coastal resorts around the Indian Ocean Sunday when a giant wave triggered by an underwater earthquake swamped the region, killing nearly 70,000 people.

The British government Wednesday pledged 15 million pounds to help the devastated area.

http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?t...storyID=7198526

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

You are doing a very good and important job darknight...

and I would like to thank you for your efforts.

amarka

[Darknight]

Up to 50 Britons Feared Dead in Asian Tsunami

Reuters reports

LONDON (Reuters) - Up to 50 Britons were feared dead Wednesday in the massive Asian tsunami after Thai authorities sharply raised the number of UK nationals killed in the country's devastated tourist resorts to 43.

A Foreign Office spokeswoman said she could only confirm a rise in the official death toll to 20 -- 14 dead in Thailand, three in the Maldives and three in Sri Lanka.

But she said the number was expected to rise.

Thousands of British tourists were vacationing in coastal resorts around the Indian Ocean Sunday when a giant wave triggered by an underwater earthquake swamped the region, killing nearly 70,000 people.

The British government Wednesday pledged 15 million pounds to help the devastated area.

http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?t...storyID=7198526

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

You are doing a very good and important job darknight...

and I would like to thank you for your efforts.

amarka

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Thanks Amarka , nice to hear

we tried to aid as much as possible through the forum.

[Darknight]

At-a-glance: UK aid drive effort

From BBC News

Aid groups warn clean water is desperately needed

With tens of thousands killed in the Asian tsunami, major efforts by British charities to help the victims are under way.

The government has pledged £15 million to help survivors of the tsunamis which Secretary of State for International Development Hilary Benn has said is the "the first phase" of the UK's commitment to helping the afflicted countries. So far 20,000 tarpaulins, 4,500 cooking sets and 40,000 sleeping mats have been purchased to be sent to the region.

Under the umbrella of the Disasters Emergency Committee (DEC), charities ActionAid, British Red Cross, Cafod, Care International, Christian Aid, Concern, Help the Aged, Merlin, Oxfam, Save the Children, Tearfund and World Vision are asking for money to provide clean water, food and shelter. People can donate at post offices, banks or online at www.dec.org.uk

Television appeals featuring sir Trevor McDonald and David Dimbleby are due to be broadcast on Wednesday evening.

About £1.5m has already been raised by individual charities to try to ease the suffering in Sri Lanka, India, Indonesia, Thailand and beyond.

Oxfam will despatch its first plane from the UK on Wednesday, carrying 27 tonnes of equipment including water tanks, pumps, pipes and sanitation kit. It will fly to Sri Lanka and Indonesia.

Oxfam has already raised £600,000 and hopes to achieve a total of £3m.

On Thursday, a British Red Cross plane will carry logistical equipment to join its team already in Sri Lanka, where the International Committee for the Red Cross has been delivering supplies and helping with evacuations. The charity is also reviewing sending more experts to the field.

The British Red Cross - which has raised £500,000 - also plans a further three flights from outside the UK.

On Sunday, Save the Children UK will send a plane to Sri Lanka where its workers have helped 37,000 families with food and medicine.

Christian Aid has already contributed £250,000 to the relief effort.

A plane loaded with supplies including tents was sent by the British government to Sri Lanka overnight on Monday.

Muslim groups including Muslim Council of Britain, Muslim Aid, Islamic Relief and Human Relief Foundation have pledged up to £500,000.

Care International has sent teams to Sri Lanka to help move vulnerable communities to higher ground, and is providing food for 14,000 people in the worst-affected areas. It is also providing aid in India and Indonesia.

World Vision is running programmes in India, Thailand, Sir Lanka and Indonesia, giving blankets, medicine, cooking utensils, hot food and shelter to survivors.

Various Sri Lankan organisations in London and the rest of the UK are raising money and collecting items for the emergency.

[Darknight]

Survivors make grisly visit to Thai tsunami morgue

Reuters reports

(Not for sensitive readers)

By Darren Schuettler

KHAO LAK, Thailand, Dec 29 (Reuters) - The stench of decaying bodies at a Thai Buddhist temple-turned temporary morgue was too much for one German survivor.

"I can't stay here anymore. It's too horrible," he said, leaving as others filed past bloated corpses looking for any clues that would identify relatives and friends missing after a tsunami ripped apart Thailand's Khao Lak beach on Sunday.

About 300 bodies arrived at Wat Yan Yao, the biggest of four temples being used a temporary morgues as rescue teams pull the dead from Khao Lak's shattered seafront hotels and debris-strewn mangrove fields.

By nightfall on Wednesday, more than 1,800 bodies had been recovered from what the wall of water left of the hotels where tourists could pay up to $200 a night.

Small groups of Thais and foreigners filed past soldiers guarding the inner temple area where several rows of bloated corpses lay, many with limbs jutting through makeshift body bags.

Identifying them may take a long time and some may never be known, said Thailand's top forensic scientist.

Pornthip Rojanasunant told Reuters she was collecting DNA samples of all the corpses at the temple -- about 20 percent foreigners -- by swabbing mouths or taking hair.

The samples could be matched to relatives later, she said.

But she suspected such meticulous procedures were not being followed at three other temples in the area, each taking in 100-200 bodies a day.

With too few surgical masks to go around, visitors were handed airline eye masks to cover their mouth and nose against the smell of decaying flesh.

The gruesome work is too much for some volunteers. One woman broke down and began sobbing until Pornthip comforted her.

"Some of them have never confronted work like this before. It's dirty and smells bad. Nobody can tolerate it," she said.

DOUSING BODIES

Health workers toiling in 30-degree heat at the temple know the dangers posed by disease while the identification process drags on.

A team of 10 volunteers -- wearing green smocks, rubber boots and surgical masks -- used garden watering cans to douse the corpses with chemicals.

"If we spray properly, then we can control the situation now. But if we get more and more bodies, we will need help," said Nattata Premsarin, a Health Ministry worker training volunteers.

The government has said no foreign bodies will be buried or cremated until the forensic work has been completed.

Only about 10 bodies have been identified by foreigners so far, Pornthip said, and as the bodies decompose her team needs better equipment to take bone samples.

"I don't know how long it will take, but we are trying our best each day," she said.

Unidentified corpses from her temple would be packed into refrigerated lorries and sent to Bangkok, Pornthip said.

[joebuzzard]

Western tourists bore brunt of Thai tidal wave disaster, officials say

12-29-2004, 07h12

Martin Oeser - (AFP/DDP)

KHAO LAK, Thailand (AFP) - Western holidaymakers -- especially Scandinavians -- bore the brunt of deadly tidal waves that hit Thailand, officials said Wednesday, as rescuers continued the horrific task of retrieving and identifying corpses.

"My estimate of the missing is not less than 1,500 and most of them were foreign tourists who were mostly out in the sea when the wave struck," top rescue official Sunthorn Riewluang told AFP.

The interior ministry's disaster prevention department said the number confirmed dead after Sunday's disaster was 1,574 with nearly 9,000 injured.

Officials have said most of those confirmed dead were tourists.

Sunthorn, who heads the department, said he expected the death toll to rise as rescuers dig deeper into wreckage in the worst-hit areas -- the formerly idyllic Phi Phi island and Khao Lak town on the mainland in Phang Nga province.

Thailand is Southeast Asia's top tourist destination, with 10 million arrivals last year.

"For the tourists the hardest-hit group was Northern Europe especially Scandinavia," Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra told reporters.

The Swedish government said on Tuesday it feared that many of its 1,500 nationals in Thailand who were still unaccounted for may be dead.

"The tidal wave catastrophe is a national trauma," said Foreign Minister Laila Freivalds.

Norway said between 700 and 800 of its citizens were unaccounted for in Thailand. "It could be the most serious catastrophe of modern times to have hit Norwegians abroad," said Foreign Minister Jan Petersen.

Nineteen French nationals have been confirmed dead and several hundred are unaccounted for, Foreign Minister Michel Barnier said during a visit to Phuket island, one of the southwestern resort areas battered by the ocean's fury.

Thaksin, who later Wednesday was to pay a second visit to the worst-hit areas, stuck to his estimate of 2,000 dead but said this could increase.

"The death toll is around 2,000 based on the occupancy rate calculations obtained from hotels but there may be more buried in the mud, floating in the sea or in hotel rooms," he told reporters.

Thaksin said hundreds of bodies may still be unrecovered, especially in the Khao Lak area where almost half the deaths were believed to have occurred.

Rescue teams from Germany, Taiwan and Sweden have arrrived to help.

Frantic relatives and Thai forensic staff were trying to identify bodies or trace loved ones as more corpses were brought to makeshift morgues.

Embassies have set up emergency operations centres in Phuket to trace the missing and give survivors temporary passports. Many were left with only their beachwear after the huge waves smashed into resorts and sucked out possessions.

Traumatised survivors were being flown home, sometimes on special planes sent by their countries. The Thai government has offered free travel for victims, many of whom had harrowing stories to tell.

"My head was touching the ceiling and I had water right under my chin. I was panicked that I wouldn't be able to breathe", said Juergen Kosian, a German from Hamburg who was with his family in the Sofitel Magic Lagoon hotel in Khao Lak.

"Everybody was crying or screaming in French, Swedish, German," he said. "The resort was 70 to 80 percent destroyed."

The health ministry sent 20 refrigerated containers to preserve corpses pending identification. But body bags and coffins were in short supply, with many bodies wrapped only in sheets or not at all.

Decomposition hampered identification.

"We are facing difficulties to separate or identify victims as of now. We have to use DNA records and even physical appearance -- it's hard to do as bodies are decaying and swollen," said Sunthorn.

Top forensic scientist Pornthip Rojanasunan said rescuers were encountering major problems as more bodies were recovered.

"I am in a local temple in Khao Lak," she told local radio. "We have 500 bodies laid everywhere and hundreds of dead bodies expected in a short time."

Pornthip said that on the first day rescue teams lacked formalin to preserve bodies. When formalin arrived they either lacked medical staff to inject it into corpses, or injection was impossible because of decay.

[onethailand]

Jor Sor 100 is currently reporting that there are signs of life in a hotel/bungalow which was 90% complete (in other words, the hotel was not open yet) - I will keep you posted.

Also - apparently, the earthquake was so strong that it slowed Earth's rotation by a few milliseconds, and actually changed the angle of Earth by an inch. Of course, I'm listening to a Thai report - but I heard this second hand from someone in the US, so I'm about to go searching for the source of this report.

[Nongchaich]

USE FOLLOWING RED CROSS LINK TO RETRIEVE FAMILLY MEMBERS

http://www.familylinks.icrc.org/thailand/locate

Edited December 29, 2004 by RDN

[onethailand]

Another report on Jor Sor 100 apparently (forgive me as my Thai is only semi-fluent and sometimes I can't keep up with the pace) says that PM Thaksin has now predicted there will be more than 3000 dead.

Considering the huge number of missing people, and the duration of the period since the disaster struck, I fear it will be much worse than that

[dclaryjr]

Thaksin said hundreds of bodies may still be unrecovered, especially in the Khao Lak area where almost half the deaths were believed to have occurred.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

My wife finally got hold of the last of her relatives last night. We were worried about one brother who travels to the south on occasion. I have a photo on my computer of him and his family standing in front of the Pascha Resort in Khao Lak from a few months ago. He says the place is GONE.

[mr_lob]

just got back from helping out at hospitals in Phangna and Takuapa - went to Khao Lak - absolutely destroyed. Trucks on top of buildings, all low-lying resorts seem to be gone. The height of the water was incredible - it really is unbelieveable. We saw THOUSANDS of bodies at the temples today - don't believe this crap on BBC and CNN.