Full extent of Indonesia disaster slowly revealed
January 02, 2005, 07:45
A week after being swamped by a massive tsunami, water is only just beginning to drain off parts of Aceh's provincial capital, revealing the full extent of the horrific destruction, and yet more bodies to count. Walking the streets of Banda Aceh today, local cleanup crews and exhausted soldiers find it hard to know where to start, their efforts hampered by a steady drizzle.
Fires burn 24 hours a day in an effort to clear areas around the main parade ground of wooden debris. The soggy ground, about the size of five football fields, is stacked with debris, smashed vehicles and badly decomposed bodies. Water has just begun to drain off many districts of this city of more than 300 000 people, exposing a nightmarish landscape of sludge, flattened homes and tangled corpses.
"I can hardly look at this. We need so much help. I cannot imagine how there can be such a tragedy," said Hayaddin (51), a street vendor. "I am so traumatised. People say more waves will come." Again during the long night, aftershocks from last Sunday's quake that triggered the killer wall of water, could be felt, sending panicked residents fleeing into the streets.
Zurhan (23), a bulldozer driver, wearing a woolen jumper over his head to filter out some of the stench of death, stood in the middle of the parade ground shaking his head. "It is so difficult to clean the ground. Everything is mixed together. I can't count how many bodies I have seen here. Look at the garbage. I'm sure there are many more there," he said.
As many as 30 000, of the roughly 80 000 Acehnese known to have died, perished in this city when the waves, triggered by the world's most powerful earthquake in 40 years, swept through. With most of the population suffering severe trauma, half a dozen mechanical excavators sat idle on the backs of trucks, authorities unable to find drivers for them. But substantial help has finally begun reaching refugees in some of the more remote parts of Aceh on the northern tip of Sumatra, and the US military has arrived in force, parking an aircraft carrier off the coast.
A ticking time bomb
Hundreds of survivors gathered at Banda Aceh's airport to watch US Sea Hawk helicopters, Singaporean military Super Puma choppers and Australian and Indonesian Hercules transports arrive and depart with aid. "This is an enormous human tragedy. The biggest problem right now is water ... It's poisoned," said Jorgen Poulsen, chief of the Danish Red Cross, outside a distribution centre for noodles and cooking oil, in front of what used to be the city's trendiest shopping centre.
"You have serious water-carrying diseases such as dysentery as a ticking time bomb. We hope we can avoid cholera. The problem is we have already seen people vomiting in town." Urgent work had begun on clearing the city's waterways. A group of Indonesian soldiers clambered into rubber boats armed with black plastic sheets to remove bodies clogging a canal.
Amid all the destruction were glimmers of hope. Local media reported 10 foreign tourists from Britain, Canada, Japan, the Netherlands and Switzerland were found alive on the small island of Weh, about 25km off the coast of Banda Aceh. "We suddenly saw huge waves around 10 meters tall coming to the shore. We ran for our lives," a British surfer identified only as Hal was quoted saying in the Jakarta Post.
If the pace of the aid and clean-up operations in Banda Aceh, the commercial hub of Aceh province, is anything to go by, conditions in the rest of the province remain dire. "We are working day and night, but the tragedy is bigger than anyone can imagine," Indonesia's Chief Social Welfare Minister Alwi Shihab said. "The aftermath is an even greater challenge and trauma." Hundreds of decomposing bodies still lie in the streets and residents report difficulty getting basic necessities, despite the vast amount of aid pouring into the city's airport.
Many people are afraid of returning to their neighbourhoods. "It's been a week and I still don't want to go home because my area is still rank with the smell of dead bodies," said tailor M. Yunus (45), at a makeshift refugee camp. "I'd rather stay here because it is also much safer. I can't stand the tremors," he said.
"I still cannot get back to my area. It's hard to go back there. I have to walk through mountains of debris and corpses," said Ismen (60), another resident. - Reuters
Update on death toll from December quake and tsunami
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Ivanova
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Matt-hurricanewatcher
India's tsunami death toll jumps to 14,488
India has raised the number of people killed or feared killed in last week's tsunami to 14,488, up by more than 1,700 since Saturday evening's estimate.
A Home Ministry statement said the rise was due to a sharp jump in the numbers missing and presumed dead in the remote Andaman and Nicobar islands, from 3,754 to 5,421.
India has mounted its biggest-ever peace-time relief operation with more than 4,000 troops deployed at home and aid shipped also to neighbouring nations Indonesia, Sri Lanka and Maldives.
But India is still struggling to get the right relief supplies to the most needy people, rescue workers and residents said.
The abundance of equipment and goods sent to some areas in worst-hit southern India was such that bundles of clothes lay heaped on street corners and food went to waste in some places while in other places people queued hours for a paltry meal.
"What is happening is that a lot of smaller voluntary agencies are coming here with supplies of clothes and other materials which are really not required," said Geetanjali Master, United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) communications officer in Tamil Nadu state's Nagapattinam.
Relief workers said an appeal by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had struck a chord across the one billion population, but poor communication meant required items such as warm blankets, pillows and bedsheets were not being donated.
Stacks of food were also being sent from various regions, but poor south Indians, used to a staple diet of rice and fish, were not able to eat it.
A government website said only a third of around 1,000 tonnes of relief material collected for India's Andaman and Nicobar Islands, which were badly battered by the tsunami, had been delivered.
Andaman and Nicobar Islands airport was so choked with rescue materials that piles of stuff lay heaped on both sides of the runway, witnesses said.
The Indian government on Saturday set up a separate coordinated relief command for the islands after a week of difficulties.
India has declined aid from other nations saying it can cope on its own.
-AFP/Reuters
India has raised the number of people killed or feared killed in last week's tsunami to 14,488, up by more than 1,700 since Saturday evening's estimate.
A Home Ministry statement said the rise was due to a sharp jump in the numbers missing and presumed dead in the remote Andaman and Nicobar islands, from 3,754 to 5,421.
India has mounted its biggest-ever peace-time relief operation with more than 4,000 troops deployed at home and aid shipped also to neighbouring nations Indonesia, Sri Lanka and Maldives.
But India is still struggling to get the right relief supplies to the most needy people, rescue workers and residents said.
The abundance of equipment and goods sent to some areas in worst-hit southern India was such that bundles of clothes lay heaped on street corners and food went to waste in some places while in other places people queued hours for a paltry meal.
"What is happening is that a lot of smaller voluntary agencies are coming here with supplies of clothes and other materials which are really not required," said Geetanjali Master, United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) communications officer in Tamil Nadu state's Nagapattinam.
Relief workers said an appeal by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had struck a chord across the one billion population, but poor communication meant required items such as warm blankets, pillows and bedsheets were not being donated.
Stacks of food were also being sent from various regions, but poor south Indians, used to a staple diet of rice and fish, were not able to eat it.
A government website said only a third of around 1,000 tonnes of relief material collected for India's Andaman and Nicobar Islands, which were badly battered by the tsunami, had been delivered.
Andaman and Nicobar Islands airport was so choked with rescue materials that piles of stuff lay heaped on both sides of the runway, witnesses said.
The Indian government on Saturday set up a separate coordinated relief command for the islands after a week of difficulties.
India has declined aid from other nations saying it can cope on its own.
-AFP/Reuters
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Matt-hurricanewatcher
Death toll surpasses 155,000; thousands still missing
Sunday, January 2, 2005 Posted: 8:27 PM EST (0127 GMT)
Survivors receive food and other supplies in Banda Aceh, northwest Indonesia, on Sunday.
Image:
(CNN) -- Hopes of finding the thousands still missing from last week's massive earthquake and deadly tsunami glimmers weakly as desperately needed aid finally reached areas that had been cut off by the devastation.
The death toll from Malaysia to East Africa stands at more than 155,000, with tens of thousands more still missing -- including thousands of tourists whose vacations took an unexpected turn early on the morning of December 26.
And the area keeps shaking.
Dozens of aftershocks have followed the 9.0 magnitude earthquake -- the strongest on the planet since 1964 -- including more than 15 with a magnitude of 5.0 or higher since Friday morning.
Indonesia, closest to the epicenter of the initial earthquake, has raised its toll to more 94,000 dead, most in its remote Aceh province -- home to a long-standing armed separatist movement that aid workers worry might complicate providing relief to victims.
But CNN's Mike Chinoy reports that the recovery effort in Aceh, after a slow start, is becoming more organized, with more armed forces and aid workers making their way to the capital, Banda Aceh, and then into the province's more remote areas.
Locals, too, are becoming more organized, Chinoy said, particularly in recovering bodies still buried beneath tonness of rubble.
One resident told Chinoy it could take up to four months to find all those killed in Banda Aceh.
It may be worse in the rest of the province.
Nothing remained of the bridge connecting Banda Aceh and the west coast -- just 160 kilometers (100 miles) from the epicenter -- except the low pillars that once held the roadway.
An Indonesian army garrison at the bridge was devastated -- of the 270 soldiers and their families stationed there, only 12 people survivied.
Where there were survivors, they swarmed military helicopters -- the only transportation that could reach most of the areas -- bringing packages of food, water and medical supplies.
Authorities set up a staging ground at the Banda Aceh airport where Australian C-130s and Indonesian military planes were bringing in supplies. U.S. helicopters from the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln picked up the packages from there.
The United States also sent helicopters to Sri Lanka, where more than 46,000 people are dead and more than 24,000 others are are missing.
India's navy launched its largest relief operation, part of a $25 million effort to help Sri Lanka.
Eleven Indian ships were dispatched to the island nation and military helicopters also ferried in relief supplies.
Already, India has delivered six tonnes of supplies to the tsunami-hit areas and plans to ship in 20 tonnes more.
In addition to relief supplies, India is sending engineers and skilled workers to help rebuild Sri Lanka's devastated economy.
India itself was hit hard by the tsunami, with at least 9,500 people dead, most on its east coast and in the remote Andaman and Nicobar Islands, closer to Thailand and Indonesia than their mother country.
Madhusree Mukerjee, an Indonesian journalist and expert on the indigenous peoples of the islands, said the Andamans -- the northernmost of the islands -- "suffered property damage but little loss of life."
"The real devastation is in the Nicobar Islands," she told CNN.
Indian officials report more than 5,400 people missing on the islands.
Mukerjee said the population of the Nicobar Islands is about 45,000 and the tsunamis "washed over many of the Nicobar Islands many times."
In one, Car Nicobar, which is also home to an Indian Air Force base, "we have been told all 15 villages have been washed out," she said.
Mukerjee said the Indian government -- which declined international aid, saying it could handle the emergency itself -- was doing as good a job as could be expected.
But she said Andaman and Nicobar could have benefited from assistance from the much closer Thailand, which also declined international financial aid.
Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra told CNN that his country did not need the financial aid but was appreciative of expertise and equipment.
Shinawatra said he was pleased to see cooperation between the private and public sectors -- and how fast the area "came back to normal activity."
Owners of hotels that survived the tsunami in Phuket, for example, are encouraging vacationers to return -- and some are. The owners say the return of the tourists is essential to their survival.
Some 70 percent of the hotels' reservations have cancelled, officials said.
But CNN's Aneesh Raman said the juxtaposition of tourists on the beach where thousands died a week ago was odd, as was watching relatively normal beach activities while knowing hundreds of thousands elsewhere were in desperate need of aid.
Jan Egeland, the U.N.'s emergency relief coordinator, said 1.8 million people needed food assistance across the affected area, adding that the number might rise further.
The World Health Program, he said, had estimated it would take it three days to set up a food distribution program to reach all those who needed it in Sri Lanka and longer still in Indonesia.
"However, air drops are being undertaken," Egeland said Sunday.
"It is the first, crude way to get food there. It is not, however, a good way to get water and medicine distributed."
Egeland said U.N. efforts were focused on Sri Lanka, Indonesia, the Maldives and Somalia, and that other governments had said they were able to handle the disaster themselves.
The effort is proceeding under rising fears of disease -- and the possibility of thousands more deaths.
"I am very worried about it," Egeland told CNN's "Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer."
"Already the incidence of diarhea is up among children."
So far, Egeland said, more than $2 billion has been pledged toward the emergency relief effort, an amount Egeland said was larger than what was pledged for all other humanitarian emergencies combined in 2004.
But it still fell short of the $3.3 billion the U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency provided Florida after four hurricanes struck the state last year.
The United States has pledged $350 million for emergency relief.
U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell, who has said that figure might not be "the end number," left Sunday to visit the region, accompanied by U.S. President George W. Bush's brother, Florida Governor Jeb Bush, and other U.S. officials. (Full story)
U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan will also visit affected areas after the conference, but Egeland said his itinerary, other than Aceh on January 7, was incomplete. (Full story)
As relief supplies began reaching survivors, a World Health Organization official said the primary concern now was to provide clean water and proper sanitation.
"Given the very difficult conditions in which people are now living, it seems very, very likely that we're going to get some increases in disease and therefore death," said Dr. David Nabarro, executive director of Sustainable Development and Healthy Environments for the WHO.
Sunday, January 2, 2005 Posted: 8:27 PM EST (0127 GMT)
Survivors receive food and other supplies in Banda Aceh, northwest Indonesia, on Sunday.
Image:
(CNN) -- Hopes of finding the thousands still missing from last week's massive earthquake and deadly tsunami glimmers weakly as desperately needed aid finally reached areas that had been cut off by the devastation.
The death toll from Malaysia to East Africa stands at more than 155,000, with tens of thousands more still missing -- including thousands of tourists whose vacations took an unexpected turn early on the morning of December 26.
And the area keeps shaking.
Dozens of aftershocks have followed the 9.0 magnitude earthquake -- the strongest on the planet since 1964 -- including more than 15 with a magnitude of 5.0 or higher since Friday morning.
Indonesia, closest to the epicenter of the initial earthquake, has raised its toll to more 94,000 dead, most in its remote Aceh province -- home to a long-standing armed separatist movement that aid workers worry might complicate providing relief to victims.
But CNN's Mike Chinoy reports that the recovery effort in Aceh, after a slow start, is becoming more organized, with more armed forces and aid workers making their way to the capital, Banda Aceh, and then into the province's more remote areas.
Locals, too, are becoming more organized, Chinoy said, particularly in recovering bodies still buried beneath tonness of rubble.
One resident told Chinoy it could take up to four months to find all those killed in Banda Aceh.
It may be worse in the rest of the province.
Nothing remained of the bridge connecting Banda Aceh and the west coast -- just 160 kilometers (100 miles) from the epicenter -- except the low pillars that once held the roadway.
An Indonesian army garrison at the bridge was devastated -- of the 270 soldiers and their families stationed there, only 12 people survivied.
Where there were survivors, they swarmed military helicopters -- the only transportation that could reach most of the areas -- bringing packages of food, water and medical supplies.
Authorities set up a staging ground at the Banda Aceh airport where Australian C-130s and Indonesian military planes were bringing in supplies. U.S. helicopters from the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln picked up the packages from there.
The United States also sent helicopters to Sri Lanka, where more than 46,000 people are dead and more than 24,000 others are are missing.
India's navy launched its largest relief operation, part of a $25 million effort to help Sri Lanka.
Eleven Indian ships were dispatched to the island nation and military helicopters also ferried in relief supplies.
Already, India has delivered six tonnes of supplies to the tsunami-hit areas and plans to ship in 20 tonnes more.
In addition to relief supplies, India is sending engineers and skilled workers to help rebuild Sri Lanka's devastated economy.
India itself was hit hard by the tsunami, with at least 9,500 people dead, most on its east coast and in the remote Andaman and Nicobar Islands, closer to Thailand and Indonesia than their mother country.
Madhusree Mukerjee, an Indonesian journalist and expert on the indigenous peoples of the islands, said the Andamans -- the northernmost of the islands -- "suffered property damage but little loss of life."
"The real devastation is in the Nicobar Islands," she told CNN.
Indian officials report more than 5,400 people missing on the islands.
Mukerjee said the population of the Nicobar Islands is about 45,000 and the tsunamis "washed over many of the Nicobar Islands many times."
In one, Car Nicobar, which is also home to an Indian Air Force base, "we have been told all 15 villages have been washed out," she said.
Mukerjee said the Indian government -- which declined international aid, saying it could handle the emergency itself -- was doing as good a job as could be expected.
But she said Andaman and Nicobar could have benefited from assistance from the much closer Thailand, which also declined international financial aid.
Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra told CNN that his country did not need the financial aid but was appreciative of expertise and equipment.
Shinawatra said he was pleased to see cooperation between the private and public sectors -- and how fast the area "came back to normal activity."
Owners of hotels that survived the tsunami in Phuket, for example, are encouraging vacationers to return -- and some are. The owners say the return of the tourists is essential to their survival.
Some 70 percent of the hotels' reservations have cancelled, officials said.
But CNN's Aneesh Raman said the juxtaposition of tourists on the beach where thousands died a week ago was odd, as was watching relatively normal beach activities while knowing hundreds of thousands elsewhere were in desperate need of aid.
Jan Egeland, the U.N.'s emergency relief coordinator, said 1.8 million people needed food assistance across the affected area, adding that the number might rise further.
The World Health Program, he said, had estimated it would take it three days to set up a food distribution program to reach all those who needed it in Sri Lanka and longer still in Indonesia.
"However, air drops are being undertaken," Egeland said Sunday.
"It is the first, crude way to get food there. It is not, however, a good way to get water and medicine distributed."
Egeland said U.N. efforts were focused on Sri Lanka, Indonesia, the Maldives and Somalia, and that other governments had said they were able to handle the disaster themselves.
The effort is proceeding under rising fears of disease -- and the possibility of thousands more deaths.
"I am very worried about it," Egeland told CNN's "Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer."
"Already the incidence of diarhea is up among children."
So far, Egeland said, more than $2 billion has been pledged toward the emergency relief effort, an amount Egeland said was larger than what was pledged for all other humanitarian emergencies combined in 2004.
But it still fell short of the $3.3 billion the U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency provided Florida after four hurricanes struck the state last year.
The United States has pledged $350 million for emergency relief.
U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell, who has said that figure might not be "the end number," left Sunday to visit the region, accompanied by U.S. President George W. Bush's brother, Florida Governor Jeb Bush, and other U.S. officials. (Full story)
U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan will also visit affected areas after the conference, but Egeland said his itinerary, other than Aceh on January 7, was incomplete. (Full story)
As relief supplies began reaching survivors, a World Health Organization official said the primary concern now was to provide clean water and proper sanitation.
"Given the very difficult conditions in which people are now living, it seems very, very likely that we're going to get some increases in disease and therefore death," said Dr. David Nabarro, executive director of Sustainable Development and Healthy Environments for the WHO.
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Matt-hurricanewatcher
Burma toll `higher than claimed'
Damien McElroy
January 3, 2005
With panic in his face, the fisherman beckoned me to lie down and hide at the prow of his longboat. The Burmese navy was patrolling its territorial waters and looking for interlopers as it sought to preserve the dictatorship's fiction that only 90 people died in last weekend's devastating tsunami.
The splintered remains of a wooden bridge just ahead, on the large island of Palao Ton Ton, told a different story. The fisherman said he saw 50 people swept to their deaths from this bridge alone. The red-and-white woodwork lay smashed in pieces and a large gap yawned in the middle of the span. ``All the people were just swept away,'' said the fisherman hopelessly.
He was sheltering at an inlet across the water when the tsunami struck with deadly force. He went to help but there were no survivors. ``They were on foot, trying to cross over to the land side,'' he said. ``Look, there are bits of the bridge still floating in the water. That is all that is left.'' In the aftermath of the tsunami the government in Rangoon sealed off parts of its coastline, fueling concerns that thousands more people died in the disaster than it - to the disgust of many ordinary Burmese - has so far been prepared to acknowledge.
Other fishermen spoke of the terrible loss of life farther up the coast at Kra Buri, 80 kilometers north of the border with Thailand. ``Many, many homes were ripped away by the big wave,'' said one fisherman. ``The government is lying, lying very much, when it says just a few people were killed.''
While aid workers believe that Burma escaped the carnage that was visited on Indonesia, they say the death toll is certain to be higher than Burmese officials have admitted.The climate of fear instilled by almost four decades of military dictatorship is such that any Burmese willing to help in exposing suffering and loss of life faces a long jail sentence.
Since the tsunami the military's grip has become even tighter. Conscript soldiers have been deployed on main roads leading out of the southern town of Kawthaung. They have orders to prevent foreign nationals from travelling more than three kilometers from the center. The naval vessels are looking for boats that they do not recognize in order to prevent unauthorized missions landing along the ravaged coastline.
A government official intercepted our vehicle as we left Kawthaung. ``Go back now,'' he said. ``I cannot give you permission to leave town and the army checkpoints will stop you. There is nothing to see.'' Instead, and despite the navy patrols, we took to the sea and made a hazardous boat trip across a mile-long stretch of estuary on the Andaman Sea. The fisherman who agreed to take us up the coast to Palao Ton Ton was too scared for his name to be used. He did not want to stay more than a few minutes in such a sensitive area with foreigners on board. He turned the boat back towards Kawthaung and then indicated the lush hillsides where homes still clung precariously to the land at the water's edge.
Kawthaung itself survived the worst of the waves because it is protected by a ring of outlying islands. Even so, boats out in the bay were lifted 19 meters on to the main road by the force of the water. There are many remote islands that no one has yet reached. The fishermen, who know them well, tell of widespread devastation on the Coco Islands and the Mergui Archipelago. The vast island chains, which belong to Burma, lie in a swathe across the Andaman Sea, north of Thailand's Phuket peninsula and south of India's Nicobar island chain - both of which suffered heavy loss of life.
Aid workers in Rangoon have repeatedly pressed the government for permission to inspect the islands but have been rebuffed. Their population has never been surveyed and the tribes who live there are renowned for their virtually amphibian way of life. Estimating the likely death toll would be very difficult.
Two days after the tsunami, when neighboring governments were gratefully accepting overseas assistance in the mass rescue operation, Rangoon brushed aside most offers of help, accepting a token 104,000 (HK$1.5 million) worth of aid from China. Brigadier General Aung Thein, the government's spokesman, declared that only 36 people had died. By the end of the week diplomats were told that the total had risen to just 90.
Further clues to the extent of the damage come, however, in reports of foreigners who are missing in the area.
From the government, however, there is no word.
Damien McElroy
January 3, 2005
With panic in his face, the fisherman beckoned me to lie down and hide at the prow of his longboat. The Burmese navy was patrolling its territorial waters and looking for interlopers as it sought to preserve the dictatorship's fiction that only 90 people died in last weekend's devastating tsunami.
The splintered remains of a wooden bridge just ahead, on the large island of Palao Ton Ton, told a different story. The fisherman said he saw 50 people swept to their deaths from this bridge alone. The red-and-white woodwork lay smashed in pieces and a large gap yawned in the middle of the span. ``All the people were just swept away,'' said the fisherman hopelessly.
He was sheltering at an inlet across the water when the tsunami struck with deadly force. He went to help but there were no survivors. ``They were on foot, trying to cross over to the land side,'' he said. ``Look, there are bits of the bridge still floating in the water. That is all that is left.'' In the aftermath of the tsunami the government in Rangoon sealed off parts of its coastline, fueling concerns that thousands more people died in the disaster than it - to the disgust of many ordinary Burmese - has so far been prepared to acknowledge.
Other fishermen spoke of the terrible loss of life farther up the coast at Kra Buri, 80 kilometers north of the border with Thailand. ``Many, many homes were ripped away by the big wave,'' said one fisherman. ``The government is lying, lying very much, when it says just a few people were killed.''
While aid workers believe that Burma escaped the carnage that was visited on Indonesia, they say the death toll is certain to be higher than Burmese officials have admitted.The climate of fear instilled by almost four decades of military dictatorship is such that any Burmese willing to help in exposing suffering and loss of life faces a long jail sentence.
Since the tsunami the military's grip has become even tighter. Conscript soldiers have been deployed on main roads leading out of the southern town of Kawthaung. They have orders to prevent foreign nationals from travelling more than three kilometers from the center. The naval vessels are looking for boats that they do not recognize in order to prevent unauthorized missions landing along the ravaged coastline.
A government official intercepted our vehicle as we left Kawthaung. ``Go back now,'' he said. ``I cannot give you permission to leave town and the army checkpoints will stop you. There is nothing to see.'' Instead, and despite the navy patrols, we took to the sea and made a hazardous boat trip across a mile-long stretch of estuary on the Andaman Sea. The fisherman who agreed to take us up the coast to Palao Ton Ton was too scared for his name to be used. He did not want to stay more than a few minutes in such a sensitive area with foreigners on board. He turned the boat back towards Kawthaung and then indicated the lush hillsides where homes still clung precariously to the land at the water's edge.
Kawthaung itself survived the worst of the waves because it is protected by a ring of outlying islands. Even so, boats out in the bay were lifted 19 meters on to the main road by the force of the water. There are many remote islands that no one has yet reached. The fishermen, who know them well, tell of widespread devastation on the Coco Islands and the Mergui Archipelago. The vast island chains, which belong to Burma, lie in a swathe across the Andaman Sea, north of Thailand's Phuket peninsula and south of India's Nicobar island chain - both of which suffered heavy loss of life.
Aid workers in Rangoon have repeatedly pressed the government for permission to inspect the islands but have been rebuffed. Their population has never been surveyed and the tribes who live there are renowned for their virtually amphibian way of life. Estimating the likely death toll would be very difficult.
Two days after the tsunami, when neighboring governments were gratefully accepting overseas assistance in the mass rescue operation, Rangoon brushed aside most offers of help, accepting a token 104,000 (HK$1.5 million) worth of aid from China. Brigadier General Aung Thein, the government's spokesman, declared that only 36 people had died. By the end of the week diplomats were told that the total had risen to just 90.
Further clues to the extent of the damage come, however, in reports of foreigners who are missing in the area.
From the government, however, there is no word.
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Matt-hurricanewatcher
Tribe shoots arrows at aid flight
By Jonathan Charles
BBC News, Andaman Islands
The island group is home to a number of tribal peoples, some extremely primitive
An Indian helicopter dropping food and water over the remote Andaman and Nicobar Islands has been attacked by tribesmen using bows and arrows.
There were fears that the endangered tribal groups had been wiped out when massive waves struck their islands.
But the authorities say the attack is a sign that they have survived.
More than 6,000 people there are confirmed as either dead or missing, but thousands of others are still unaccounted for.
The Indian coastguard helicopter was flying low over Sentinel Island to drop aid when it came under attack.
Dozens of tribesmen fired bows and arrows at the helicopter, a traditional warning that outsiders aren't welcome.
A senior police officer said the crew weren't hurt and the authorities are taking it as a sign that the tribes haven't been wiped out by the earthquake and sea surges as many had feared.
The Andaman and Nicobar archipelago is home to several primitive tribes, some so isolated that they are still stuck in the stone age.
Officials believe they survived the devastation by using age-old early warning systems.
They might have run to high ground for safety after noticing changes in the behaviour of birds and marine wildlife.
Scientists are examining the possibility to see whether it can be used to predict earth tremors in future.
By Jonathan Charles
BBC News, Andaman Islands
The island group is home to a number of tribal peoples, some extremely primitive
An Indian helicopter dropping food and water over the remote Andaman and Nicobar Islands has been attacked by tribesmen using bows and arrows.
There were fears that the endangered tribal groups had been wiped out when massive waves struck their islands.
But the authorities say the attack is a sign that they have survived.
More than 6,000 people there are confirmed as either dead or missing, but thousands of others are still unaccounted for.
The Indian coastguard helicopter was flying low over Sentinel Island to drop aid when it came under attack.
Dozens of tribesmen fired bows and arrows at the helicopter, a traditional warning that outsiders aren't welcome.
A senior police officer said the crew weren't hurt and the authorities are taking it as a sign that the tribes haven't been wiped out by the earthquake and sea surges as many had feared.
The Andaman and Nicobar archipelago is home to several primitive tribes, some so isolated that they are still stuck in the stone age.
Officials believe they survived the devastation by using age-old early warning systems.
They might have run to high ground for safety after noticing changes in the behaviour of birds and marine wildlife.
Scientists are examining the possibility to see whether it can be used to predict earth tremors in future.
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Matt-hurricanewatcher
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