Indonesia tsunami toll climbs to 463

INDONESIA: Emergency workers found scores of corpses amid the ruins left behind by the Indonesian tsunami, pushing the death toll from the disaster to at least 463, the government said Wednesday.

More than 280 were listed as missing, said Heri, from the department of social affairs.

“We are keeping up the search for people, hopefully we can find them alive,” said police Capt. Joko, who like Heri goes by a single name.

A magnitude 7.7 undersea earthquake Monday triggered two-meter-(two-yard) high walls of water that smashed a 180-kilometer (110-mile) stretch of beach on Java, which was unaffected by the devastating 2004 Asian tsunami.

The waves destroyed houses, restaurants and hotels. Boats, cars and motorbikes were tossed hundreds of meters (yards) inland.

The Hawaii-based Pacific Tsunami Warning Center and Japan’s Meteorological Agency issued warnings of a possible tsunami. It struck Java’s southern coast about 45 minutes later.

Science and Technology Minister Kusmayanto Kadiman appeared to back away from comments Tuesday that the government received both bulletins, but did not attempt to announce the warnings.

He told el-Shinta radio Wednesday that the government’s meteorological agency sent SMS messages to at least 400 officials and one of his staffers appeared on national television to warn of the tsunami.

Meanwhile Thousands awoke from a second night on mosque floors or under makeshift shelters on Indonesia’s Java island on Tuesday as authorities grappled with the aftermath of a tsunami that killed at least 368 people.

As efforts continued to find 235 people still missing, the media questioned why there was no warning ahead of Monday’s killer waves despite regional efforts to set up early alert systems after the massive Indian Ocean tsunami of 2004.

The Jakarta Post said in an an editorial that the country’s National Disaster Management Coordination Board had done “nothing of note to increase people’s preparedness for disasters”. “Preparedness also covers efforts to build effective early warning systems based on sophisticated information and communication technologies,” the daily said.

Heavy equipment to search for bodies under the rubble was in place on Wednesday along parts of the 160-km (100-mile) stretch of south Java’s coastline that was battered by waves after a 7.7-magnitude undersea earthquake.

Officals said there were four dead foreigners, including a Dutch national, a Swede, a Japanese and a Belgian.

More than 54,000 people were displaced from wrecked fishing villages and beach resorts, adding to the rehabilitation headache for the authorities after an earthquake that killed more than 5,700 people in central Java less than two months earlier.

Aid trucks started to arrive for the thousands who lost their homes or who, fearing further tsunamis, fled to hills above the coast.

Many found refuge under plastic-sheeting shelters while thousands camped out in mosques at the resort of Pangandaran and nearby Cilacap port, which were among the hardest-hit spots.

Pangandaran, Wednesday, AFP, Reuters