Indonesia death toll could reach 100,000

As foreign military cargo planes touched down in Indonesia today with emergency aid, fears rose that the bodies of perhaps tens of thousands of victims will never be found. Entire villages have been swept to sea.

Indonesia’s official death toll stood at about 80,000, but Health Minister Siti Fadillah Supadi said it could reach 100,000.

In the fishing village of Meulaboh, whole swaths of land were stripped bare, with only some home foundations and debris remaining. About a quarter of the town’s 40,000 people were feared dead, but only a fraction of that number had been found.

“It is very difficult to predict the final toll,” said Dody Budiatman, co-ordinator of relief efforts for the government in Jakarta. "We could search in small boats, but considering the numbers it would be very difficult.”

Officials have even admitted they are not sure how many corpses they have buried.

One way to estimate the total has been to take the number of bodies in one mass grave and multiply it by the number of graves.

In other cases, they estimate the population of a village, count the survivors and assume the rest have been killed.

Meanwhile, the flow of aid – including medicines and body bags for the dead - got a big boost as the first of many expected US C-130 cargo planes arrived at the regional airport here.

Relief teams from Taiwan, Australia, South Korea and other nations were also already on the ground.

An emergency summit of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations was called for January 6 to discuss the disaster response.

According to a government statement, supplies have arrived on Sumatra from 18 countries on 42 sorties by Friday. Military C-130s from Australia and New Zealand have also joined in the airlift effort.

“Seeing the destruction makes me sad,” Captain Jennifer Clavenna, of Alexandria, Virginia, said as the US plane was unloaded Friday. “I’m hoping we can bring enough supplies.”

But getting the aid to those who need it has proved to be a logistical nightmare in an area that has little functioning government and a decimated infrastructure.

While tons of aid sit unopened at the airport, droves of refugees have established a tent village along the main road leading into Banda Aceh, the provincial capital on the island of Sumatra.

“It’s on the path of the aid trucks,” said one refugee, Umi Sana.

Having made it through the worst natural disaster to hit this region in decades, Sana and perhaps a million other people are now trying to just make it through each day.

Like hundreds of others living out of tents – mainly just plastic tarps - along a 200-meter (660ft) stretch of road,

Sana washes with water from a nearby well. Her only possessions are a bundle of clothes.

And like many, her main concern is the whereabouts of her family.

She came here with her husband to work, and her six children remained behind in Meulaboh. With the village virtually washed away, she has had no way to confirm whether her children are alive or dead.

“Can you get me on a military plane?” she asked frantically.

Rotting bodies and piles of debris continue to clutter the streets, with the local government in disarray. Officials are burying corpses by the truckload, but say they lack the manpower to dig them all out and transport them to mass graves.

“It will take at least two weeks for us to have the people and equipment we need here,” said Aigor Lacomba, of a consortium of European aid groups. "It means nothing to bring a whole lot of staff if you have nowhere for them to live.”

With the fear of disease increasing, medical workers scrambled to establish a foothold.

Ade Bachtiar, a volunteer nurse from Jakarta, arrived here on Wednesday to help at an impromptu clinic set up in an abandoned souvenir shop.

“Yesterday, we could only stay open for about two hours due to the lack of electricity,” he said.

Nevertheless, he added, they treated 60 to 80 people, mainly closing and cleaning wounds.

“Medicine is running out, especially antiseptics,” he said.

In Jakarta, Foreign Minister Hassan Wirajuda said the international tsunami summit would generate more emergency aid for the disaster.

Wirajuda said heads of state or representatives from the tsunami-affected countries, as well as major aid donors and international organisations, would be invited.

He said he hoped the 10 members of the Association of South East Asian Nations, as well as China, Japan, South Korea, India, Sri Lanka, Australia, New Zealand and the United States, would attend.