INDONESIA: Tourist recounts surviving tsunami on Indonesia's Java coast as death toll hits 105

A tsunami triggered by a strong undersea earthquake off the coast of Indonesia's Java island on Monday (July 17) killed 105 people, swept away buildings and damaged hundreds of fishing boats, officials and witnesses said. News of the disaster spread panic across a region still recovering from a tsunami less than two years ago in which nearly 230,000 people were killed or reported missing, mostly in Indonesia. But there were no reports of casualties or damage in any other country from Monday's tsunami. An official at the Indonesian Red Cross disaster centre said there were 105 people dead, 148 people injured and 127 still missing. He said 2,875 people had been displaced from their homes. Waves up to 1.5 metres (five feet) high crashed into Pangandaran beach near the town of Ciamis, 270 km (170 miles) southeast of Jakarta, killing 46 people in Ciamis and another 46 in the central Java port of Cilacap. Another Red Cross official said around 650 fishing boats had been damaged. In the Pangandaran medical clinic in the early hours of Tuesday morning (July 18), several victims' bodies were laid out on the floor covered by cloth. Family members began searching among the bodies to find their missing loved ones. "The total number of deaths we have so far here is 41, but there is likely to be more because some affected areas are hard to reach still so I believe there will be more (casualties)," said Kanda, a police officer on duty at the clinic. A 40-year-old Belgian tourist called Ian, who did not give a last name, said he was in a bar when suddenly water rushed in. "I saw this big cloud of dark seawater coming up to me. So I grabbed the bag and started running and I ended up in the kitchen and there was no door, cos it was locked and then the water grabbed me and pulled me under and I was thinking this is the end, I'm going down, I'm going to drown, and then suddenly the wall of the kitchen collapsed and it freed me so I could get hold of the cooler box, it kept me floating," he said. The waves washed away wooden cottages and kiosks lining the shoreline facing the Indian Ocean, witnesses said. Indonesia's official Antara news agency reported deaths had occurred at two other beach resorts in Java. Sweden's Foreign Ministry said two Swedish children from a holidaying family were believed to be missing. There were no immediate reports of other non-Indonesians dead or missing. The U.S.-based Pacific Tsunami Warning Center said the quake had a magnitude of 7.2, while the U.S. Geological Survey put it at 7.7. Indonesia's state meteorology and geophysics agency said the quake's strength was 6.8 on the Richter Scale. Indonesia's 17,000 islands sprawl along a belt of intense volcanic and seismic activity, part of what is called the "Pacific Ring of Fire". A tsunami warning for Java's southern coast and nearby Christmas Island was issued by the Pacific Centre. Police on Christmas Island, an Australian territory south of Indonesia, said there was no damage there. India also issued a warning for the Andaman and Nicobar islands, badly hit by the 2004 tsunami, but officials said there was no real threat. The Maldives, a low-lying chain of islands to the southwest of India, also issued a warning. The December 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami was triggered by a massive earthquake. Nearly 170,000 people were killed or reported missing in Indonesia's Aceh province. Tens of thousands died elsewhere, the majority in Sri Lanka, India and Thailand.

ITN Source | July 18, 2006

Tags:. .meteorology. .port. .ocean. .australian. .tourist