Mercy flights leave for tsunami-hit Sololmons

Survivors picked through ruined stores today in a desperate search for drinking water and food in a Solomon Islands town devastated by a tsunami, as an international relief effort made tentative first steps.

Thousands of people in the town of Gizo in the South Pacific country’s far west spent the night sleeping under tarpaulins or the stars on a hill behind the town following a massive undersea earthquake that sent tsunami waves crashing through the town.