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Homeless tsunami survivors cover their noses from the stench of rotting bodies as they leave the Indonesian city of Banda Aceh, on Wednesday. free video
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Red Cross fears tsunami toll could top 100,000
'Disaster of unprecedented proportion' also brings threat of diseaseNBC News and news services
Updated: 9:49 a.m. ET Dec. 29, 2004BANDA ACEH, Indonesia - The Red Cross said Wednesday it feared the death toll in Sunday's earthquake and tsunamis in the Indian Ocean could top 100,000.
"We're facing a disaster of unprecedented proportion in nature," said Simon Missiri, Asia Pacific chief at the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies.
The agency said its current estimate is 77,000, but it fears that could rise.
Workers from Indonesia to India rushed to bury corpses to ward off disease Wednesday as cargo planes touched down with promised aid — from lentils to water purifiers — to help the region cope with the catastrophe.
Chances faded of finding more survivors of Sunday's massive, quake-driven walls of water — probably the deadliest in history.
"We have little hope, except for individual miracles," Chairman Jean-Marc Espalioux of the Accor hotel group said of the search for thousands of tourists and locals missing from beach resorts of southern Thailand — including 2,000 Scandinavians.
Threat of disease
Millions were homeless in the disaster, contending with hunger and the threat of disease, which the U.N. health agency said could double the toll.
SLIDE SHOW
• Tsunamis hit Asia
Click "Launch" to view images from a massive earthquake that hit Asia, sparking deadly tsunamis, killing tens of thousands in 11 countries.
"The initial terror associated with the tsunamis and the earthquake itself may be dwarfed by the longer term suffering of the affected communities," said Dr. David Nabarro, head of crisis operations for the World Health Organization.
He said local hospitals and health services were overwhelmed treating victims of the tsunami and thus less able to cope with people who may fall ill.
Robert Bazell, NBC's chief science correspondent, said the health risk for survivors is twofold.
“There is a shortage of clean water and an enormous amount of water left behind. That’s a recipe for disaster from diseases such as cholera and typhoid, which are spread by fecal material that gets into the water,” he said. “Also, millions are homeless in a very wet situation; that’s a huge potential for the spread of respiratory diseases and other lesser-known diseases which can kill people, especially children.”
In the Indonesian island of Sumatra, nearest the Indian Ocean epicenter of Sunday's calamitous 9.0-magnitude quake that triggered the tsunamis, bulldozers prepared to dig graves for thousands of corpses lining the streets and lawns of provincial capital Banda Aceh.
With the threat of disease on the rise and few ways to identify the dead, there was no choice but to get the bodies under ground, said military Col. Achmad Yani Basuki. "We will start digging the mass graves today," he said.
Thousands more bodies found
The first Indonesian military teams reached the devastated west coast of Sumatra island on Wednesday, finding thousands of bodies.
Town after town along the Sumatran coast was covered with mud and sea water, with homes flattened or torn apart, an Associated Press reporter saw on a helicopter overflight with the military commander of the island’s Aceh province. The only signs of life were a handful of villagers scavenging for food on the beach.
“The damage is truly devastating,” Maj. Gen. Endang Suwarya said. “Seventy-five percent of the west coast is destroyed and some places it’s 100 percent. These people are isolated and we will try and get them help.”
The first military teams reached the devastated fishing town of Meulaboh on Sumatra’s coast, finding some 3,700 bodies — bringing Indonesia’s toll to more than 36,200. That toll was likely to rise as more bodies are found. One official on Tuesday estimated that as many as 10,000 people were dead in Meulaboh alone.
A U.N. official cited by Reuters said the toll from the Indonesia region of Aceh could alone reach 50,000-80,000.
"My mother, no word! My sisters, brothers, aunt, uncle, grandmother, no word!" yelled a woman at a makeshift morgue in Lhokseumawe, Indonesia. "Where are they? Where are they? I don't know where to start looking."
At least 12 Americans were among the dead, and U.S. embassies in the region were trying to track down hundreds more who were unaccounted for.
Amid the devastation, however, there were miraculous stories of survival. In Malaysia, a 20-day-old baby was found alive on a floating mattress and was reunited with her family.
In Thailand, 2-year-old Hannes Bergstroem, who was found dazed and alone after the waves hit, was claimed by an uncle after his photograph was posted on the Internet.
A U.N. agency has said that one-third of the disaster's victims were children.
Related coverage
• Latest developments
• Bush: U.S. aid ‘only the beginning’
• WP: Did Bush miss chance
• WP: Agony in Aceh
• 'Miracle' amid hunt for survivors
• Kin mourn American victims
• NBC: Sri Lanka hard hit
• How scientists watch for killer waves
• How to help
• Free video gallery
• Tsunami fact box
Biggest ever relief operation
Aid groups struggled to mount what they described as the largest relief operation the world has seen, and to head off the threat of cholera and malaria epidemics that could break out where water supplies are polluted with bodies and debris.
In addition to the threat of disease, flooding uprooted land mines in Sri Lanka — torn for years by a civil war — threatening to kill or maim aid workers and survivors attempting to return to what's left of their homes.
The world's biggest insurer, Germany's Munich Re, estimated the damage to buildings and foundations in the affected regions would be at least $13.6 billion.
Donations for recovery efforts came in from all parts of the globe.
The governments of the United States, Australia and Japan pledged a combined $100 million while taxi drivers in Singapore put donation tins in their cars and volunteers in Thailand text-messaged aquaintances to give blood to the Red Cross.
President Bush said Wednesday the United States would offer support to help the victims.
Speaking at his ranch in Crawford, Texas, the president rejected criticism of U.S. efforts.
Earlier this week, Jan Egeland, the U.N. official overseeing the relief effort, suggesting America was being “stingy” by only making an initial pledge of $15 million in aid.
Bush said Egeland was "very misguided and ill-informed."
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Homeless tsunami survivors cover their noses from the stench of rotting bodies as they leave the Indonesian city of Banda Aceh, on Wednesday. free video
Red Cross fears tsunami toll could top 100,000
'Disaster of unprecedented proportion' also brings threat of diseaseNBC News and news services
Updated: 9:49 a.m. ET Dec. 29, 2004BANDA ACEH, Indonesia - The Red Cross said Wednesday it feared the death toll in Sunday's earthquake and tsunamis in the Indian Ocean could top 100,000.
"We're facing a disaster of unprecedented proportion in nature," said Simon Missiri, Asia Pacific chief at the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies.
The agency said its current estimate is 77,000, but it fears that could rise.
Workers from Indonesia to India rushed to bury corpses to ward off disease Wednesday as cargo planes touched down with promised aid — from lentils to water purifiers — to help the region cope with the catastrophe.
Chances faded of finding more survivors of Sunday's massive, quake-driven walls of water — probably the deadliest in history.
"We have little hope, except for individual miracles," Chairman Jean-Marc Espalioux of the Accor hotel group said of the search for thousands of tourists and locals missing from beach resorts of southern Thailand — including 2,000 Scandinavians.
Threat of disease
Millions were homeless in the disaster, contending with hunger and the threat of disease, which the U.N. health agency said could double the toll.
SLIDE SHOW
• Tsunamis hit Asia
Click "Launch" to view images from a massive earthquake that hit Asia, sparking deadly tsunamis, killing tens of thousands in 11 countries.
"The initial terror associated with the tsunamis and the earthquake itself may be dwarfed by the longer term suffering of the affected communities," said Dr. David Nabarro, head of crisis operations for the World Health Organization.
He said local hospitals and health services were overwhelmed treating victims of the tsunami and thus less able to cope with people who may fall ill.
Robert Bazell, NBC's chief science correspondent, said the health risk for survivors is twofold.
“There is a shortage of clean water and an enormous amount of water left behind. That’s a recipe for disaster from diseases such as cholera and typhoid, which are spread by fecal material that gets into the water,” he said. “Also, millions are homeless in a very wet situation; that’s a huge potential for the spread of respiratory diseases and other lesser-known diseases which can kill people, especially children.”
In the Indonesian island of Sumatra, nearest the Indian Ocean epicenter of Sunday's calamitous 9.0-magnitude quake that triggered the tsunamis, bulldozers prepared to dig graves for thousands of corpses lining the streets and lawns of provincial capital Banda Aceh.
With the threat of disease on the rise and few ways to identify the dead, there was no choice but to get the bodies under ground, said military Col. Achmad Yani Basuki. "We will start digging the mass graves today," he said.
Thousands more bodies found
The first Indonesian military teams reached the devastated west coast of Sumatra island on Wednesday, finding thousands of bodies.
Town after town along the Sumatran coast was covered with mud and sea water, with homes flattened or torn apart, an Associated Press reporter saw on a helicopter overflight with the military commander of the island’s Aceh province. The only signs of life were a handful of villagers scavenging for food on the beach.
“The damage is truly devastating,” Maj. Gen. Endang Suwarya said. “Seventy-five percent of the west coast is destroyed and some places it’s 100 percent. These people are isolated and we will try and get them help.”
The first military teams reached the devastated fishing town of Meulaboh on Sumatra’s coast, finding some 3,700 bodies — bringing Indonesia’s toll to more than 36,200. That toll was likely to rise as more bodies are found. One official on Tuesday estimated that as many as 10,000 people were dead in Meulaboh alone.
A U.N. official cited by Reuters said the toll from the Indonesia region of Aceh could alone reach 50,000-80,000.
"My mother, no word! My sisters, brothers, aunt, uncle, grandmother, no word!" yelled a woman at a makeshift morgue in Lhokseumawe, Indonesia. "Where are they? Where are they? I don't know where to start looking."
At least 12 Americans were among the dead, and U.S. embassies in the region were trying to track down hundreds more who were unaccounted for.
Amid the devastation, however, there were miraculous stories of survival. In Malaysia, a 20-day-old baby was found alive on a floating mattress and was reunited with her family.
In Thailand, 2-year-old Hannes Bergstroem, who was found dazed and alone after the waves hit, was claimed by an uncle after his photograph was posted on the Internet.
A U.N. agency has said that one-third of the disaster's victims were children.
Related coverage
• Latest developments
• Bush: U.S. aid ‘only the beginning’
• WP: Did Bush miss chance
• WP: Agony in Aceh
• 'Miracle' amid hunt for survivors
• Kin mourn American victims
• NBC: Sri Lanka hard hit
• How scientists watch for killer waves
• How to help
• Free video gallery
• Tsunami fact box
Biggest ever relief operation
Aid groups struggled to mount what they described as the largest relief operation the world has seen, and to head off the threat of cholera and malaria epidemics that could break out where water supplies are polluted with bodies and debris.
In addition to the threat of disease, flooding uprooted land mines in Sri Lanka — torn for years by a civil war — threatening to kill or maim aid workers and survivors attempting to return to what's left of their homes.
The world's biggest insurer, Germany's Munich Re, estimated the damage to buildings and foundations in the affected regions would be at least $13.6 billion.
Donations for recovery efforts came in from all parts of the globe.
The governments of the United States, Australia and Japan pledged a combined $100 million while taxi drivers in Singapore put donation tins in their cars and volunteers in Thailand text-messaged aquaintances to give blood to the Red Cross.
President Bush said Wednesday the United States would offer support to help the victims.
Speaking at his ranch in Crawford, Texas, the president rejected criticism of U.S. efforts.
Earlier this week, Jan Egeland, the U.N. official overseeing the relief effort, suggesting America was being “stingy” by only making an initial pledge of $15 million in aid.
Bush said Egeland was "very misguided and ill-informed."
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