It first hit the land in the Indonesian province of Aceh. A massive underwater earthquake as strong as 9.3 on the Richter scale, sweeping away 160,000 people in towns and villages with walls of waves up to 20 to 30 metres high at a speed up to 800 km/h, so powerful it picked up ships and left them several miles inland. It was the biggest natural disaster in history – the Indian Ocean tsunami.
The huge tsunami then travelled across the region, destructing communities in Thailand, Sri Lanka and India, killing at least a quarter of a million people. December 26 may be just a date after Christmas for some, but for the families that have lost their loved ones, and for the survivors of the devastating incident, it remains a day for reflection, awakening and gratitude.
The 2004 tsunami that left over 8,000 people dead and lives of several lakhs upside down as it carved a trail of destruction and despair in Tamil Nadu also taught the administration several valuable lessons in disaster management and relief, said a senior official who was then heading a district which faced the brunt.
“It was a very costly lesson in disaster rehabilitation, though we still wish the lesson could have been learnt in a text-book than being on the field post a major disaster,” state Health Secretary J.Radhakrishnan, then collector of Nagapattinam that was worst-affected among the state’s 13 coastal districts with 6,100 deaths.
First Hand Encounter And Myths
“Ibu… ibu… pak… pak…Where are you? I’m scared,” those were the feelings of Camelia Lubis, who was just a teenager when the tsunami tragedy hit Banda Aceh.
In an interview with Malaysian Digest, Camelia reminisces the tragedy with much trauma and tells us how she is
who was killed before her very eyes.
t is learned that majority of the population in Banda Aceh are Muslims. Many locals believe the disaster was a curse linked to the sins of the region, and they deemed
still left with a permanent scar, but grateful for her and her family’s miraculous survival. On the contrary, she is still saddened by the loss of her best friend
the catastrophe a wake-up call from God. Camelia recalls of a story that she heard about an Imam who cautioned a non-practising Muslim woman, the night before the tragedy.
“The 2004 tsunami taught the government and officials several lessons on being prepared to meet the known and unknown hazards; involvement of community in reconstruction and rehabilitation; the essence of speed in decision-making; the administrative model to meet the immediate needs of the affected and others,” he said.
According to Radhakrishnan, whose grit and determination on the post-tsunami period is still recalled gratefully by villagers of Akkaraipettai in Nagapattinam, Tamil Nadu’s experience in rehabilitation and reconstruction activities is now taught to Indian Administrative Service officials. Radhakrishnan said the first lesson learnt is to be prepared for not only known hazards but also unknown ones. He said Nagapattinam is a cyclone-prone area but what was not known till 2004 was about a tsunami’s effect. “Even a country like Japan had to face a cascading effect of the earthquake.
