Related: South Asia Sinking Under Tsunamis
"Indonesian quake toll at 1,100; Thousands feared buried beneath ruins" by Irwan Firdaus, Associated Press | October 2, 2009
Soldiers and volunteers carried a survivor from the wreckage of a collapsed hotel in Padang, on Indonesia’s Sumatra Island, yesterday. Officials said the death toll is expected to rise as rescue efforts continue. (Muhammad Fitrah/Reuters)
PADANG, Indonesia - As rescue workers searched for survivors in the wreckage of a four-story school yesterday, Mira Utami’s mother clawed away, too, looking for the shoes missing from her daughter’s body.
Mira was taking a high school English final when the quake hit, flattening the school in seconds and killing her a week before her 16th birthday. “We had planned to celebrate . . . but she’s gone,’’ said her mother, Malina, weeping amid the wreckage where the barefoot body was found.
John Holmes, the UN humanitarian chief, set the death toll at 1,100 and said the number was expected to grow. Government figures put the number of dead at 777, with at least 440 people seriously injured. Wednesday’s 7.6-magnitude earthquake started at sea and quickly rippled through Sumatra, the westernmost island in the Indonesian archipelago.
An eerie quiet settled over Padang late yesterday as workers called off search efforts for the night. Thousands are thought trapped under shattered buildings in the city of 900,000, raising fears of a significantly higher death toll when the debris is cleared....
President Obama, who spent part of his childhood in Indonesia, pledged to support earthquake recovery efforts there as well as providing assistance in the South Pacific countries of Samoa and American Samoa, which were hit by a deadly tsunami Tuesday....
Where a mall once stood was a heap of concrete slabs layered like pancakes with iron rods jutting out....
I always wonder why those damn Twin Towers that fell at free-fall speed didn't look like that after pancaking.
One of the hospitals in the town had collapsed completely while the state-run Djamil Hospital was partly damaged - its walls cracked and windows broken. Staff at the hospital treated the injured in tents set up in the open. In another area, rows of yellow body bags were laid out in rows.
Oh!
Mira, a sophomore, was taking an end-of-term English exam along with dozens of classmates at the Indonesia-America Institute when the ground shook so severely that the tremors were felt in neighboring Malaysia and Singapore. Her father Zul rushed to the school, but it was already a heap of concrete when he got there. Still, he pulled at the slabs and managed to save two other children and an adult, his wife said.
A real hero -- someone who just reacted with urgency no matter what the cost!
The school building’s construction was typical of the region, which is located in one of the poorest countries in the world. Most buildings are not made to withstand earthquakes, and even the tough ones were badly damaged in an earthquake in 2007. There is virtually no enforcement of building regulations in Indonesia, a nation of 235 million people prone to natural and man-made disasters.
So some of this was preventable then.
Indonesia sits on a major geological fault zone and experiences dozens of quakes every year. A 6.8 magnitude quake shook Sumatra on Thursday but there were no reports of deaths. Both quakes originated on the fault line that spawned the 2004 Asian tsunami that killed 230,000 people in a dozen nations.
That is really spooky.
Related: Earthquake strikes central California
Remote part of eastern Calif. shaken by temblors
I was worried about that.
But back to much more important matters right now:
"Survivors of Indonesian quake found" by Irwan Firdaus and Eric Talmadge, Associated Press | October 3, 2009
Thank God they found some.
A rescue team carried out a survivor named Suci who had been trapped in a building in Padang, Indonesia, since Wednesday’s earthquake. (Wong Maye-E/Associated Press)
PADANG, Indonesia - Ratna Kurniasari Virgo lay surrounded by death for 40 hours - trapped with a broken leg between the collapsed walls of her college and the bodies of her dead friends.
Her rescue yesterday was a rare tale of survival two days after a massive Indonesian earthquake killed at least 715 people and left nearly 3,000 missing under the rubble of tens of thousands of buildings. The wail of ambulances and the stench of decomposing bodies met volunteers from dozens of relief agencies yesterday as they poured into the worst-hit area around the regional capital of Padang.
Block after block of toppled hotels, hospitals, office buildings, and schools had yet to be searched and dozens of unclaimed corpses were laid out in the scorching sun at Dr. M. Djamil General Hospital, Padang’s biggest, which was damaged.
Wednesday’s 7.6 magnitude temblor devastated a stretch of more than 60 miles along the western coast of Sumatra island, prompting a massive international aid operation in a country where earthquakes have taken a huge human toll in recent years. The United Nations estimates that the death toll from this quake could rise to 1,100. More than 20,000 houses and buildings were destroyed and 2,400 people hospitalized across seven districts, said Priyadi Kardono, a spokesman for the national disaster agency....
As the scale of the destruction became clearer, Vice President Jusuf Kalla told reporters in the capital, Jakarta, that the recovery operation would cost at least $400 million because the “impact of this disaster has worsened.’’
Military and commercial planes shuttled in tons of emergency supplies, although rural areas remained cut off from help because of landslides that reportedly crushed several villages and killed nearly 300 people.
I know the government is trying to do its best, but....
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Boston’s Indonesian community is reeling after a powerful earthquake struck the country this week, including a Hyde Park couple still missing relatives on the island of Sumatra.
“I have aunts and uncles in Padang,’’ the capital of West Sumatra, said Munassarni Bantacut, 51. “We cannot get it yet on the phone, but we heard from somebody - they said my aunt and uncle are OK but the house is gone. We have nephews also, but they still don’t know where’’ they are.
Bantacut was born in Padang, and grew up in nearby Medan, where most of her immediate family still lives. She was able to briefly contact her brother yesterday via cellphone, confirming his safety. Munassarni Bantacut and her husband, Najib, who have been in the United States since 1992, are planning to hold a gathering at their home tomorrow to mourn with fellow Indonesians and raise money for relief. In 2004, Najib Bantacut, 56, organized an event at Roxbury Community College that raised $10,000 to $12,000 for tsunami disaster relief.
The 2004 tsunami struck NajibBantacut’s hometown of Aceh, which is also on Sumatra, destroying the homes of his mother, brother, and sister, but sparing their lives. When news of the first earthquake reached Hyde Park Wednesday, the couple relived memories of 2004.
“I find out yesterday morning on CNN. They made it seem like a tsunami,’’ said Najib Bantacut, a construction worker. “We thought it was going to be another.’’
Yeah, they are finding out how AmeriKa's MSM sucks.
Reactions were similar elsewhere in Boston’s Indonesian community.
“The first time I heard, my heart just stopped beating, my brain just stopped, my hands went cold immediately,’’ said Anai Njendu, 35, of Boston. “I needed to find out what’s going on. It’s hard to hear from the news. . . . It’s better to talk to family and see what’s really happening.’’
Or read blogs.
Njendu grew up in northern Sumatra, hundreds of miles away from the epicenter of the quake. Her family felt the tremors, but all are safe. “My brother’s friends are [in Padang],’’ she said. “He tried to contact them but it’s hard to, with the phone connections and all that.’’
Njendu, who came to the United States in 1998, also revisited bad memories from 2004, when her mother died in the tsunami. David Tong, 33, a pastor at The Reformed Evangelical Fellowship of Indonesia in Boston, said he has been following the story and will begin collecting donations this weekend.
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And as the tide goes out:
"Samoas get aid from military; Tsunami death toll rises to 160" by Rod McGuirk and Audrey McAvoy, Associated Press Writers | October 2, 2009
Boys surveyed the ruins of Salebata village on the south coast of Samoa yesterday. A tsumani triggered by an undersea earthquake destroyed coastal settlements in the Samoas on Tuesday. (Torsten Blackwood/AFP/Getty Images)
APIA, Samoa - Convoys of military vehicles brought food, water, and medicine to the tsunami-stricken Samoas yesterday as the death toll rose to 160 and victims wandered through what was left of their villages with tales of being trapped underwater and watching children drown.
I don't know how they could bear it. I don't know if I could without going mad.
Samoan government minister, Fiana Naomi, asked about 400 grieving relatives for permission to hold a mass funeral next Tuesday. The grim-faced Samoans, gathered under the shade of a traditional wall-less meetinghouse just 100 yards from the ocean amid coconut trees and government offices, were largely silent. Naomi told them the government would provide free coffins for the 103 bodies held in the city morgue. She said the other bodies had already been buried due to the advanced stage of decomposition, but did not say how many.
A total of 160 people are now confirmed dead, including 120 in Samoa, 31 in American Samoa, and nine in Tonga. Hundreds of police and others resumed what Samoan police commander Lilo Maiava called “a painstaking search’’ for bodies that could continue another three weeks. The Samoas lie about halfway between New Zealand and Hawaii.
The governments of the United States, Australia, and New Zealand sent in supplies and troops, including a US Navy frigate carrying two helicopters that will be used in search-and-rescue efforts.
This is what militaries should be used for.
Lieutenant Colonel Charles Anthony said the Hawaii Air National Guard and U.S. Air Force flew three cargo planes to American Samoa that carried 100 Navy and Army guard personnel and reservists....
The scene of mayhem stood in sharp contrast to the breathtaking scenery that Samoans are accustomed to: The islands are surrounded by majestic waters and beaches that quickly give way to lush volcano-carved mountainsides and tropical forests dotted with taro and coconut farms.
Paradise Destroyed!
Before the disaster struck, the majority of the population in American Samoa lived below the poverty line, with tuna canneries, coconut plantations, and tourism representing the bulk of the territory’s economic activity. The canneries produce the tuna consumed in millions of American household, with Starkist and Chicken of the Sea having huge factories on American Samoa.
Translation; the price of tuna will be going up.
But the local tuna industry has been in turmoil since the companies were forced to pay workers the U.S.-mandated minimum wage, something they have historically avoided.
Why has this article degenerated into a business promotion?
Long before the tsunami hit, Chicken of the Sea planned to close its packing plant on the island this week and lay off more than 2,100 workers, amounting to a double-whammy for workers who lost their jobs and saw their homeland ravaged by disaster in the same week.
Prime Minister Tuilaepa Sailele’s own village of Lesa was washed away, like many others on Samoa and nearby American Samoa and Tonga. He described seeing complete devastation....
Al Palmer returned to his home in American Samoa and saw nothing but rubble following Tuesday’s 8.0-magnitude earthquake and tsunami. The tsunami swept his wife out of their home and sent her several hundred feet inland. She survived by grabbing ahold of a pole and is now in the hospital being treated for injured fingers....
Thank God she lived.
"Military searches for bodies in Samoas" by Rod McGuirk and Audrey McAvoy, Associated Press | October 3, 2009
A family paused where a neighbor’s house once stood on Samoa’s southern coast. (Tim Wimborne/Reuters)
LALOMANU, Samoa - The relief effort in the tsunami-stricken Samoas entered its fourth day yesterday as medical teams gave tetanus shots and antibiotics to survivors with infected wounds, and some frightened residents who fled to the hills after the disaster vowed never to return to their decimated seaside villages.
Grieving survivors began to bury their loved ones, while others gathered under a traditional meeting house to hear a government minister discuss plans for a mass funeral and burial next week. Many survivors wore masks to reduce the growing stench of rot.
The death toll from Tuesday’s earthquake and tsunami rose to 169 as searchers found more bodies in Samoa, where 129 were confirmed dead, police commissioner Lilo Maiava told the Associated Press. Thirty-one others were killed in the US territory of American Samoa and nine in Tonga. Maiava said drowning appeared to be the main cause of death, and some bodies were still being plucked from the sea. Police dug others from sand, mud, and debris. Maiava said the search for bodies could continue for another three weeks.
A refrigerated freight container was used as a temporary morgue for the scores of bodies at a Samoan hospital. Among the hardest-hit areas was the village of Leone in American Samoa, where four elderly women were swept out to sea as they gathered on the shore to weave Samoan mats and other artifacts. A 6-year-old girl is also feared dead in the village.
The United States, Australia, and New Zealand sent in supplies and troops, including a US Navy frigate carrying two helicopters for search-and-rescue efforts. The Hawaii Air National Guard and US Air Force flew three cargo planes to American Samoa carrying 100 Navy and Army guard personnel and reservists....
Many residents who raced up hillsides as the tsunami closed in remained too scared to return to their villages. More headed to the hills Wednesday night after an aftershock shook the region.
As if their nerves weren't frayed enough already.
“It’s a scary feeling, and a lot of them said they are not coming to the coastal area,’’ Red Cross health coordinator Goretti Wulf said near the flattened village of Lalomanu on the devastated south coast of Samoa’s main island, Upolu. “The lesson they learned has made them stay away.’’
Workers at Lalomanu’s makeshift emergency supply base began carting water, food, tarps, and clothes to 3,000 people in the hills.
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May God please watch over all of them and relieve their suffering.
