Grieving families hunt for bodies

WAILING relatives scrambled over hundreds of bodies piled in a Sri Lankan hospital yesterday, searching for loved ones as the tsunami death toll soared above 12,000 on the island.

In the ravaged southern port town of Galle, a trail of devastation emerged as flood waters receded.

Upturned buses blocked streets, contents of entire homes peppered thick muddy silt and residents appeared too shocked to start cleaning up. Flood waters deposited mounds of garbage and even a bus in the centre of the town’s ruined cricket pitch.

Local jeweller Ifti Muaheed stood staring at an empty shell where his gem shop used to stand. Tens of thousands of euro worth of precious stones were washed away when floods punched through his windows.

“Three generations of our family business have gone just like that,” he said stoically.

Government officials said 1.5 million people had been displaced from their homes.

In the nearby village of Karapitiya, wailing relatives scrambled over hundreds of piled-up bodies searching for loved ones at a hospital, while others milled outside, holding shirts or handkerchiefs over their noses against the stench of decaying bodies.

“We have got hundreds of dead that we have dealt with,” said one local hospital official.

Corpses of hundreds of those drowned when the tsunami crashed into Sri Lanka early on Sunday lay bloated and disfigured throughout the lobby and corridors of the hospital.

The body of a pregnant woman lay in the hospital lobby as hundreds of relatives scrambled over the piles of dead. Nearby, a woman collapsed in grief as she identified a relative. Many were children. A nurse wept as she picked up the body of a baby.

Officials said the death toll could be much higher because hundreds of people washed out to sea have not yet been accounted for yet.

The government said about 200 foreign tourists, including several Japanese, were feared dead. Survivors relived their lucky escapes.

Giant waves crashed into the island on Sunday morning after a powerful earthquake off distant Indonesia, sending a deluge of seawater into towns and villages.

“We are not well equipped to deal with a disaster of this magnitude because we have never known a disaster like this,” said President Chandrika Kumaratunga, who declared a national disaster and appealed for donor aid while on holiday in Britain.

Aid agencies readied consignments of plastic sheeting and essential foods.

“What is most important is food, clean water and shelter,” said Roland Schilling, senior programme officer for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in Colombo.

Many hotels along the southern coastal belt - packed with tourists - were flooded. Hundreds were holed up at a Colombo convention centre.

Tamil Tiger rebels, whose two-decade war for autonomy killed more than 64,000 people, said hundreds of Tamils in the northern and eastern strongholds were stranded and thousands more had lost their homes.

Army sentry points in the north were washed away. Scandinavian monitors of a three-year ceasefire were evacuated from the eastern port of Trincomalee to avoid floods and uprooted landmines.