Sunday 28 December 2014

Tsunami - ten years on...

It is sometimes hard to believe that it is ten years since the Boxing Day Tsunami. There has been a lot on tv the last few days.

And also on the 40th anniversary of Cyclone Tracy which wiped out Darwin on Christmas Eve in 1974. I was at the farm in the Mallee - we didnt have a tv (and even if we had it would have been in black and white!!) and so I hadnt really seen many images. But Christmas Eve had a programme on the terribel destruction, the deaths and injuries, and then the massive emergancy airlift where 30,000 people (mostly women and children - the men stayed behind to clean up) were flown out to capital cities all around the country.
Here is a wiki link for Cyclone Tracy, that should give you enough information if you didnt know about it (too young? Too far away?)

The images are so very redolent of what we saw when we arrived in Banda Aceh post tsunami. We went in early February, six weeks after the disaster, but there was still so much devastation. Lots of bodies, both animals and people, piles of rubble metres high, smoking burnign rubbish/buildings. It was hell. We went there to establish an orphange but it was a bit pointless as there so very few orphans - most children couldnt swim even if they ahd been able to fight against the water. Which was 30 metres high when it hit Banda Aceh.

Here are my photos. It is still difficult to look at them. I thinkI have PTSD. We didnt get very well looked after at the end, just sent home, no debrief - that would have helped. I am still friends with Sue Bastone via Facebook which helps.

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