U.S. Water News Online
BANDA ACEH, Indonesia -- Pilots dropped food to Indonesian villagers stranded among bloating corpses, while police in a devastated provincial capital stripped looters of their clothing and forced them to sit on the street as a warning to others. The death toll topped 150,000, and officials warned that five million people lack clean water, shelter, food, sanitation and medicine.
As a colossal international rescue effort struggled off the ground, relief efforts suffered a hitch when a false alarm of more killer waves sparked panic in India, Sri Lanka and Thailand and sent survivors and aid workers fleeing.
Indian women at a makeshift camp in a marriage hall said their children were going hungry. "For the past few days we were at least getting food," said Selvi, 35, who uses one name. "Today, we didn't even get that because aid workers fled the town after a fresh alert was issued this morning."
The false alarm from the Indian government was just one of the new and sometimes unexpected threats facing survivors.
Sister Charity, a 32-year-old nun rescued by an Indian navy ship from the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, said confused and hungry crocodiles were on the loose.
"As we were returning [to the ship], two or three crocodiles started coming toward us. The navy officers had to fire their revolvers to ward off the crocodiles to protect us," she told The Associated Press.
In the remote Indian islands near the epicentre of the magnitude-9.0 earthquake, entire villages were wiped out. With only 400 bodies found so far, the region's administrator said 10,000 people were missing. Survivors who reached the archipelago's main city, Port Blair, said they had not eaten for two days.
Around the Indian Rim and beyond, families endured their fifth day of ignorance as to the fate of friends and relatives who had taken a holiday-season vacation to the sunny beaches of Thailand, India and Sri Lanka, which bore the brunt of the tsunami. Thousands were still missing, including at least 2,500 Swedes, more than 1,000 Germans and 500 each from France and Denmark.
At least four Canadians were among the dead -- three in Thailand and one in Sri Lanka, Foreign Affairs Canada said. There are still 13 Canadians officially missing and another 74 are unaccounted for.
Ottawa, meanwhile, announced a moratorium on debt for countries affected by the tsunamis.
Foreign Affairs Minister Pierre Pettigrew said the moratorium will be in effect as the area rebuilds.
Indonesia owes the most, at $588-million (Canadian), or about $488-million (U.S.).
Canada has so far allocated $40 million (Canadian), or $33-million (U.S.), to the aid effort, and is working primarily through humanitarian organizations such as World Vision and Doctors Without Borders. Ottawa has also sent planeloads of relief supplies.
Governments have so far donated some $500-million (U.S.), United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan said, adding that he was "satisfied" by the response.
Death tolls across the region continued to grow. Indonesia led with some 94,000. Sri Lanka reported 30,000, India more than 15,000 and Thailand around 2,400. A total of more than 300 were killed in Malaysia, Myanmar, Bangladesh, the Maldives, Somalia, Tanzania and Kenya.
Military ships and planes rushed aid to Sumatra's ravaged coast. Countless corpses strewn on the streets rotted under the tropical sun causing a nearly unbearable stench.
In Banda Aceh, the devastated main city of northern Sumatra, soldiers and police guarded abandoned shops in the city's market amid fears of looting. Three alleged looters caught by police were put on the street stripped to their underpants as a deterrent.
Food drops began along the coast, mostly of instant noodles and medicines, with some of the areas "hard to reach because they are surrounded by cliffs," said Budi Aditutro, head of the government's relief team.
In Galle, the graceful old city on the southern tip of Sri Lanka, German and Finnish teams helped set up water plants and mobile clinics.
In Washington, U.S. President George W. Bush announced that a delegation of experts led by Secretary of State Colin Powell will travel to Asia to assess the situation.
A U.S. air force plane arrived in the capital, Colombo, bringing 26 medical specialists from the army, marines and air force, which form part of the Pacific Fleet Command.
American planes already have delivered 1,400 body bags to southern islands in Thailand, where Interior Minister Bhokin Balakula said more than 3,500 bodies have been found. Rescue and forensic teams from Australia, Japan, Germany, Israel and other countries fanned out across Thailand trying to find survivors and identify rapidly decomposing corpses.
Return to the U.S. Water News' past archives page
Or Return to the U.S. Water News Homepage
Editor@uswaternews.com
*Your Name:
*Your Email:
*Friend's Email:
Use a comma to separate e-mail addresses:
*Your Comments:
Hi, I thought you might like to read this article.
*Required Fields