Major earthquake strikes Chile, causing damage, some injuries
(11/15/07)
SANTIAGO, Chile -- A major earthquake struck northern Chile on Wednesday, toppling power lines, closing roads and sending terrified residents into the streets. Authorities reported 20 injuries but no deaths from the quake, which was felt in the capital as well as neighboring Peru and Bolivia...
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World disasters
Typhoon triggers landslides in China
(09/20/07) SHANGHAI, China -- Typhoon Wipha weakened Wednesday as it swept across China, bringing torrential rains that destroyed thousands of houses and triggered landslides, killing five people. Authorities in Shanghai and nearby provinces evacuated some 2.7 million people, mostly from coastal regions, boats and unsafe housing... 
Heavy rain floods Britain, forcing evacuations; River Thames rising
(07/24/07)TEWKESBURY, England -- Emergency workers rescued hundreds of trapped people Monday as water swallowed swaths of central England in the worst flooding to hit the country for 60 years. Officials said some rivers were still rising, with the western section of the rain-swollen River Thames on the verge of bursting its banks...
10 people swept under waves after quake causes landslide into ocean in southern Chile
(04/23/07) SANTIAGO, Chile -- An earthquake in remote southern Chile shook free a landslide of rocks, sending them smashing into a narrow fjord and causing massive 25-foot waves that swept away 10 beachgoers. Two bodies were recovered Sunday. Rescuers were searching the cold Pacific waters for the other missing people from the beach after the magnitude-6.2 quake the day before, authorities said...
Earthquake triggers tsunami in Solomon Islands
(04/02/07) HONIARA, Solomon Islands -- A powerful undersea earthquake Monday in the South Pacific sent a tsunami several yards high crashing into the Solomon Islands, devastating at least one village, officials and residents said. Police and residents said a wave about 10 feet high struck the western town of Gizo, inundating buildings and causing widespread destruction. ... 
Piece of missing jet found in Indonesia
(01/11/07)MAKASSAR, Indonesia -- A fisherman found a piece of a jetliner missing for more than 10 days in northwestern Indonesia, the first hard evidence that the plane carrying 102 people had crashed, a top search official said Thursday. The piece of the Boeing 737's tail was recovered Wednesday from the Makassar Strait off Sulawesi Island, said Eddy Suyanto, the head of search and rescue operations...
Search resumes for missing Indonesian jetliner
(01/04/07) POLEWALI, Indonesia -- Rescuers scoured the ocean for a missing jetliner on Wednesday, one day after senior Indonesian officials erroneously said the Boeing 737's charred wreckage had been found in a remote mountainous area, and that a dozen people may have survived...
Taiwan quake highlights telecom network's fragility
(01/02/07) SINGAPORE -- A few seconds of undersea quaking was all it took to cause massive telecommunications disruptions throughout tech-savvy Asia, where Internet services slowed or stopped, phone lines went dead and financial transactions ground to a halt. Analysts and industry insiders said the service disruption -- caused by the rupture of two undersea data transmission cables in the Dec. ... 
Bodies of all 17 trapped men found after Poland coal mine explosion
(11/24/06)RUDA SLASKA, Poland -- The bodies of all 17 men trapped underground after a mine explosion in southern Poland have been found, bringing the death toll to 23 in the country's worst mining disaster in three decades, the mining company said Thursday. President Lech Kaczynski declared three days of mourning after the last of the victims were found following an arduous 38-hour search more than 3,000 feet below ground... 
Small tsunami waves hit Japan after offshore earthquake
(11/16/06)TOKYO -- A powerful undersea earthquake prompted tsunami warnings Wednesday for Japan, Russia and Alaska, but the danger passed after a series of tiny waves hit the northern Japanese coast. Several thousand people fled to higher ground on Japan's northernmost island of Hokkaido. The waves, however, did not swell higher than 16 inches and rapidly diminished in size, and Japan's meteorological agency later withdrew its tsunami warning after about three hours, although it urged continued caution...
Jackson grad aboard crashed jetliner
(10/03/06) A Jackson High School graduate was among the 155 people aboard a Brazilian jetliner that crashed in the Amazon jungle Friday. Authorities have said there were no survivors from the crash. Douglas Hancock, 35, was in the Brazilian state of Mato Grosso for business, and was on the flight back to his home in Rio de Janeiro to spend time with his wife over the weekend, said his father, Paul Hancock, who lives in Jackson...
Earthquake in Gulf of Mexico sends shock waves from La. to Fla.
(09/11/06) TAMPA, Fla. -- The largest earthquake to strike the eastern Gulf of Mexico in the last 30 years sent shock waves from Louisiana to southwest Florida Sunday, but did little more than rattle residents. The magnitude 6.0 earthquake, centered about 260 miles southwest of Tampa, was too small to trigger a tsunami or dangerous waves, the U.S. Geological Survey said...
China begins massive cleanup after Typhoon Saomai
(08/13/06) BEIJING -- Chinese authorities distributed emergency food supplies to evacuees and began massive clean-up efforts Saturday in the wake of Typhoon Saomai, which killed 105 people and left another 190 missing after it tore through the country's southeast...
Death toll grows as strongest typhoon to strike China in 50 years makes landfall
(08/11/06) BEIJING -- The most powerful typhoon to hit China in five decades raged across its southeastern coast Thursday, claiming at least 111 lives as it capsized ships, destroyed buildings and forced 1.5 million people from their homes. Typhoon Saomai, with winds up to 135 mph, made landfall at the town of Mazhan in coastal Zhejiang province, the Xinhua News Agency said, citing weather officials...
Search for tsunami survivors in Indonesia
(07/19/06) PANGANDARAN, Indonesia -- Indonesia pledged to build a nationwide tsunami alert system as soldiers pulled bodies from ravaged beaches, homes and hotels Tuesday. Parents searched tearfully for their children and the death toll hit at least 463, with nearly 280 people missing...
Mount Merapi spews hot gas clouds, 15,000 villagers flee
(06/09/06) MOUNT MERAPI, Indonesia -- Mount Merapi spewed a column of gas and sent clouds of hot ash tumbling down its slopes Thursday, causing 15,000 villagers to flee. Some jumped into rivers to escape the searing heat, and others sped off in trucks. No injuries or deaths were reported...
Strong aftershock shakes Indonesian earthquake zone
(06/04/06) BANTUL, Indonesia -- The Mount Merapi volcano spewed lava and hot clouds Saturday and a strong aftershock hit the region, sending fear rippling through the southern Indonesian area devastated by an earthquake only a week ago. The mountain's lava dome has swelled in the past week to 330 feet, raising fears that it could collapse, said Subandriyo, a government scientist who uses one name. ...
Strong earthquake off Pacific island nation of Tonga generates small tsunami
(05/04/06) NUKU'ALOFA, Tonga -- A magnitude 8.0 earthquake struck early today near the South Pacific nation of Tonga, prompting tsunami warnings for as far away as Fiji and New Zealand. The warning was lifted after a tsunami of less than 2 feet was recorded. There were no reports of injuries or damage from the quake or tsunami. ...
Three strong earthquakes kill at least 70, injure 1,200 in western Iran
(04/01/06) TEHRAN, Iran -- Earthquakes and aftershocks rattled western Iran one after another, flattening villages and sending frightened homeowners into the streets. By Friday morning 70 people were dead, 1,200 wounded, and thousands homeless. The death toll would have been much higher, residents said, but police told townspeople to sleep outside after a 4.7-magnitude quake struck Thursday evening...
Teams of experts work to clear toxic air from collapsed Mexican mine
(02/26/06) SAN JUAN DE SABINAS, Mexico -- Teams of experts drilled holes above a collapsed coal mine Saturday to release toxic gases that have forced rescuers to suspend a search for 65 miners trapped by an explosion a week ago. Machines bored holes up to 10 inches in diameter up to 560 feet deep, to the bottom of the Pasta de Conchos mine, and officials were analyzing the air quality. ...
Snow-laden roof over Moscow market collapses, killing at least 56 people
(02/24/06) MOSCOW -- Rescuers paused repeatedly in hopes of hearing survivors trapped under concrete and metal beams Thursday after a snow-laden roof collapsed on one of Moscow's biggest markets, killing at least 56 people. Investigators blamed the disaster on a buildup of snow after a harsh winter, design flaws or poor maintenance...
Search for landslide survivors slowed by rain
(02/23/06) GUINSAUGON, Philippines -- Rescue workers were thwarted Wednesday in a last-ditch effort to find an elementary school buried by a devastating landslide when a two-ton drill brought in by U.S. Marines couldn't be used and heavy rain forced officials to call off the day's search...
Rescue workers desperately trying to free 65 workers trapped in Mexican coal mine
(02/21/06) SAN JUAN DE SABINAS, Mexico -- They waited all night and throughout the morning, huddled under blankets and around bonfires in a patch of rough, windblown desert. But as the sun came out and the hours crawled by Monday, the family members, friends and neighbors of 65 trapped coal miners started to lose hope...
Official: Underground sounds raises hopes for survivors at buried school
(02/21/06) GUINSAUGON, Philippines -- Rescue workers refused to give up hope of finding survivors in an elementary school buried by up to 100 feet of mud, digging into the night Monday after detecting what the provincial governor called "signs of life." Sounds of scratching and a rhythmic tapping were picked up by seismic sensors and sound-detection gear brought in by U.S. and Malaysian forces...
Fear of losing land keeps earthquake survivors rooted to snowed-in villages
(01/09/06) MAIDAN, Pakistan -- The snow is waist-deep, food stocks are dangerously low and villagers say the cold has been killing their children since a devastating earthquake three months ago. But most Pakistanis in the remote northwestern village of Maidan won't be leaving for warmer lowland camps. They have no land deeds and fear moving could cost them their homes...
Powerful quake rattles Greece, felt as far away as Middle East, Italy
(01/09/06) ATHENS, Greece -- A powerful earthquake shook Greece on Sunday and was felt as far away as the Middle East and Italy. Minor damage was reported in southern Greece, and authorities on the island of Crete said three people were slightly injured. No tsunami warnings were issued...
Storms and quake leave patchwork of hope, grief and questions
(12/31/05) The Katrina-soaked carpets inside the New Orleans convention center squished when you walked on them. And I was running, trying to keep up with a frightened man who said several people had died in the heat and he was going to show me their bodies. He pushed ahead, but I kept getting waylaid, stopped by one after another of the homeless and helpless spread across the cavernous hall: families clutching garbage bags stuffed with belongings, tourists with brightly colored rollaway luggage, babies and elderly lying asleep on sheets spread across the wet floor.. ...
Tsunami-struck province a testament to successes and failures
(12/25/05) It has been a year since the tsunami laid waste to the isolated Indonesian province of Aceh, but tens of thousands of people still live in a vast archipelago of shanty towns made of scrap wood spit back by the sea. Along the coast, towns and villages remain nothing but swampland and ankle-high rubble. In plywood barracks hurriedly built across the region, survivors are jammed together in windowless rooms...
Chinese spill prompts promises of better public safety
(12/05/05) JIAMUSI, China -- A new disaster. An outcry that officials failed to warn China's public until it was almost too late. Another promise that next time, the government will do better. China's leaders say they will punish those responsible for a toxic spill in a major river. But there is no sign that they want to change a culture of secrecy that they consider not just a key political weapon but a legitimate way to deal with the Chinese public...
Russia's Amur River faces ecological blow from benzene spill
(12/03/05) KHABAROVSK, Russia -- Fishermen are quick to tell yarns about the big catch. But on the banks of the Amur River, the stories anglers lovingly recount are about fish that did not reek of chemicals. A toxic spill heading this way from China is just the latest ecological blow to the Amur, whose basin is home to 5 million Russians. For years, residents have been warned not to swim in the river, eat its fish or even drink water from their taps because of pollutants and bacteria...
Post-earthquake Kashmir winter claims first life
(11/29/05) BAGH, Pakistan -- The baby boy survived the devastating earthquake in the Himalayan highlands. Then came the cold and the snow. On Monday, the 3-month-old became the first reported victim of what officials fear will be a new disaster for the 3.5 million Pakistanis who lost their homes last month: winter...
Chinese city restores running water after shutdown caused by toxic spill
(11/28/05) HARBIN, China -- Running water returned to this northeast city of 3.8 million people Sunday, ending a five-day shutdown blamed on a chemical spill that embarrassed the government and highlighted China's mounting environmental problems. However, officials warned that what was coming out the tap in frigid Harbin still was too dirty to drink...
Earthquake in southern Iran flattens villages, kills 10 people
(11/28/05) TEHRAN, Iran -- An earthquake with a magnitude of at least 5.9 shook a sparsely populated area of southern Iran on Sunday, flattening seven villages, killing 10 people and injuring 70, officials and state-run television said. The temblor was felt as far away as Oman and the United Arab Emirates...
Magnitude-6.5 quake strikes off Indonesia
(11/20/05) JAKARTA, Indonesia -- A magnitude-6.5 quake struck an island off the coast of Sumatra on Saturday, triggering a tsunami alert, officials said. The quake's epicenter was located on Simeulue Island, about 160 miles southwest of Medan on Sumatra's west coast, according to the U.S. ...
British girl credited with saving 100 tourists
(11/04/05) UNITED NATIONS -- Tilly Smith, just 10 years old at the time, put her geography lessons to good use: by quickly recognizing the warning signs of a tsunami, the English schoolgirl saved about 100 people from near-certain death at a Thai resort. ...
Hurricane Katrina-hit U.S. Navy battalion helps quake victims in Pakistan
(11/02/05) MUZAFFARABAD, Pakistan -- U.S. Navy equipment operator Craig Ries steered his 15-ton truck through this earthquake-ravaged city and recalled the destruction of a disaster thousands of miles away -- Hurricane Katrina. The storm swept away the two-story apartment complex in Mississippi where he lived in with his wife and two children...
Relief helicopters could be grounded unless donors make good
(10/29/05) MUZAFFARABAD, Pakistan -- U.N. helicopters ferrying supplies to South Asia's earthquake survivors will be grounded within a week and relief operations scaled back unless aid agencies receive more funding and donors make good on pledges worth millions of dollars, officials said Friday...
Tourists battle to get out of Cancun
(10/26/05) CANCUN, Mexico -- Tens of thousands of haggard tourists, fed up after five days in hot and dirty emergency shelters, battled for airline and bus seats out of Mexico's hurricane-battered Caribbean resorts on Tuesday. Officials said they still had no solid estimate of the damage caused by Hurricane Wilma, which lashed the coastline Friday and Saturday and wiped out the heart of Mexico's $11 billion foreign tourism industry, even washing away Cancun's famed white beaches...
Alpha blamed for at least 10 deaths before weakening
(10/25/05) PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti -- Alpha, the Atlantic season's record-breaking 22nd named storm, left at least 10 people dead in Haiti and the Dominican Republic before moving north into the Atlantic Ocean and weakening into a tropical depression, authorities said Monday...
Villagers flee as winter nears
(10/24/05) PARAS, Pakistan -- The trees along the river are starting to change color, and the leaves are turning yellow and gold. On the high mountains a few miles away, snow is already falling, leaving an ever-increasing coat of white far above the tree line...
Looting breaks out after Wilma slams Mexico
(10/24/05) CANCUN, Mexico -- Mexicans and stranded tourists, hungry and frustrated after a two-day beating by Hurricane Wilma, stood in line to buy supplies Sunday or simply raided grocery or furniture stores, dragging goods from shops ripped open by the storm...
India proposes allowing quake victims to cross Kashmir border
(10/23/05) MUZAFFARABAD, Pakistan -- In another sign of growing cooperation between South Asia's nuclear rivals, India offered on Saturday to let Pakistani earthquake victims cross the cease-fire line in Kashmir to receive aid at three relief camps it was setting up...
Pakistani survivors tussle over first food and aid to arrive
(10/22/05) GHANOOL, Pakistan -- About 200 desperate people pushed and fought each other for milk, bread and other food brought in Friday by mule train -- the first aid to reach their remote mountain village since Pakistan's earthquake left them homeless two weeks ago...
Wilma rakes Mexico coast
(10/22/05) CANCUN, Mexico -- Hurricane Wilma tore into Mexico's resort-studded Mayan Riviera on Friday, filling the streets with water, shattered glass and debris as thousands of stranded tourists hunkered down in hotel ballrooms and emergency shelters. Packing winds of 140 mph, the storm shattered windows and downed trees that crushed cars on the island of Cozumel, a popular cruise-ship stop. Pay phones jutted from floodwaters in the famed hotel zone...
Earthquake orphans thousands; Pakistan promises care for all
(10/19/05) RAWALPINDI, Pakistan -- Before Mohamed Sajid was bundled onto a rescue helicopter from earthquake-ravaged Muzaffarabad, his father scrawled his son's name -- and his own -- on a piece of paper and stuffed it into the boy's shirt pocket. Five days later, 13-year-old Mohamed clung to that piece of paper at Rawalpindi General Hospital -- a small slip of security in his unsettled life...
Death toll in Pakistan quake nears 40,000
(10/16/05) BALAKOT, Pakistan -- The death toll from Pakistan's earthquake rose sharply to nearly 40,000 Saturday, with the president warning the numbers could jump still higher as relief teams reach more villages in the endless folds of the Himalayan mountains...
Search for survivors ends in quake zone
(10/15/05) MUZAFFARABAD, Pakistan -- Rescue workers abandoned the search Friday for survivors trapped in the rubble of last week's earthquake, though individual efforts continued, with an 18-month-old girl pulled out alive from the ruins of her home. A top U.N. ...
The ordeals of one isolated village in devastating earthquake
(10/13/05) Editor's note: An Associated Press reporter and photographer walked three hours from Muzaffarabad to Sanger, a mountain village isolated by landslides from South Asia's earthquake and cut off from aid relief. SANGER, Pakistan -- For four nights, the people of this ruined mountain village have slept in the cold, surrounded by hundreds of freshly dug graves and the cries of people injured in the weekend earthquake. There is no medicine here, little food and, until very recently, no help...
Officials estimate earthquake's death toll at more than 35,000
(10/12/05) MUZAFFARABAD, Pakistan -- Heavy rain and hail forced the cancellation of some relief flights to earthquake-stricken regions Tuesday and survivors scuffled over the badly needed food -- the first large-scale aid to make it overland to this devastated city. Officials estimated that the death toll would surpass 35,000...
Guatemala's Indians refuse soldiers' help, deal with hundreds of dead on own
(10/11/05) SANTIAGO ATITLAN, Guatemala -- A Guatemalan Indian community, haunted by a government-sponsored massacre during the country's brutal civil war, refused soldiers' help Monday in recovering those killed in a week of flooding and mudslides and conducted its own searches instead...
Thousands dead in rubble
(10/11/05) Desperate Pakistanis huddled in the cold waiting for earthquake aid to reach remote areas. MUZAFFARABAD, Pakistan -- Desperate Pakistanis huddled against the cold and some looted food stores Monday as international aid still had not reached remote areas of mountainous Kashmir after a monster earthquake flattened villages, cut off power and water, and killed tens of thousands...
Rescuers struggle to reach victims
(10/10/05) Relief efforts mobilized; death toll reaches 20,000, expected to rise even higher. MUZAFFARABAD, Pakistan -- Rescuers worked to reach remote, mountainous areas Sunday after Pakistan's worst-ever earthquake wiped out entire villages, buried roads in rubble and knocked out electricity and water supplies. The death toll stood at 20,000 and was expected to rise...
Guatemala digs out the dead as toll from rains, floods surges
(10/09/05) SANTIAGO ATITLAN, Guatemala -- Dozens of Mayan Indians used hand tools to dig through hardening mud on Saturday, searching for bodies under a landslide that swallowed a Guatemalan neighborhood and pushed the regionwide death toll from a week of pounding rains to 613...
Pakistan quake claims 18,000
(10/09/05) The tremors caused buildings in an area 625 miles across to sway for about a minute. ISLAMABAD, Pakistan -- It began as a gentle swaying, but the ground's convulsions quickly grew wilder -- shaking walls, roofs and floors. Within seconds, mud-brick homes buckled, bigger buildings pancaked, earth and rock slid down hillsides, burying the helpless...
Child survivors of tsunami slowly conquering the sting of memories
(06/25/05) STOCKHOLM, Sweden -- Karl Nilsson, 7, was found dazed, battered and alone in a Buddhist temple after the tsunami swept his parents and two brothers away six months ago. Dr. Marie Guldstrand's family brought him back to Sweden. Today he lives iwth his grandparents in Boden...
Tsunami rebuilding stalls as survivors must confront government
(05/16/05) DEAH GEULUMPANG, Indonesia -- Political squabbling, donor demands and government indecision have stalled the building of roads, water treatment plants and nearly 180,000 homes for survivors of last December's tsunami. Aid agencies, which plan to spend more than $7 billion on tsunami relief across the Indian Ocean basin, have put massive building projects on hold while waiting for Indonesian authorities to come up with a solid plan. ...
Quake hits near Indonesian island of Sumatra
(04/11/05) JAKARTA, Indonesia -- A strong undersea earthquake rocked the Indonesian island of Sumatra on Sunday, sending thousands of people fleeing from their homes in panic, but no tsunami was triggered, seismologists said. The 6.8-magnitude temblor smashed windows in the west Sumatran city of Padang, state news agency Antara reported. There were no reports of casualties or major damage...
Rescuers abandon search for quake victims in main city
(04/01/05) A U.N. official said teams would concentrate their work in other areas. By Chris Brummitt ~ The AssociatedPress GUNUNG SITOLI, Indonesia -- International rescuers abandoned their search today for survivors in the main city of the Indonesian island that bore the brunt of a powerful earthquake four days ago...
Confirmed quake death total at 518
(03/31/05) GUNUNG SITOLI, Indonesia -- Firefighters freed a man trapped in a crumpled house on remote Nias island on Wednesday, 36 hours after he was buried in rubble. As the first foreign military help arrived, officials said an estimated 1,000 people had died in the region's latest large earthquake...
South Asia recovers from panic over quake
(03/29/05) BANDA ACEH, Indonesia -- A powerful earthquake struck off Indonesia's west coast late Monday, killing scores of people whose homes collapsed on them and spreading panic across the Indian Ocean that another killer tsunami was on the way. Indonesia's vice president predicted up to 2,000 deaths...
Despite billions in tsunami relief needs, some aid groups stop collecting donations
(03/16/05) WASHINGTON -- Several major charities and relief agencies have stopped soliciting donations for tsunami victims and at least one has begun returning money. Billions of dollars more ultimately will be needed for long-term rebuilding in the devastated Asian region. But agencies sensitized by recent charity scandals say they're being careful not to accept more money now than they legitimately can spend in aiding tsunami victims...
Former presidents promise tsunami survivors more aid
(02/21/05) LAMPUUK, Indonesia -- Former presidents Bush and Clinton traveled Sunday to ground zero of tsunami devastation where they described the destruction as unimaginable and promised survivors who begged for shelter that more help would come. On the second day of their relief mission to the region, the two former leaders flew in U.S. ...
SEMO students help raise funds for tsunami relief
(02/03/05) The American Red Cross will seek donations from Southeast Missouri State University students next week to assist relief efforts for victims of the tsunami that devastated the Indian Ocean region in late December. American Red Cross collection cans will be set up in the University Center, Dempster Hall and the Towers complex Monday through Friday. ...
Bureaucratic battle over those missing after tsunami
(01/23/05) VAILANKANNI, India -- Six members of Melvin Antony's family were washed away when killer waves struck this town, though only one body was found. After weeks of hoping against hope, Anthony has come to accept that all are dead. But he has yet to convince India's bureaucrats...
Aid groups worry U.S. military is backing out of tsunami relief
(01/22/05) BANDA ACEH, Indonesia -- Aid groups warned on Friday it might be too soon for the U.S. military to scale back its emergency operations for Asia's tsunami victims, while an informal cease-fire between Indonesian troops and rebels appeared to have collapsed, threatening to derail relief efforts...
U.S. military begins withdrawing from tsunami relief efforts
(01/21/05) BANDA ACEH, Indonesia -- The U.S. military -- the largest group helping tsunami survivors -- will immediately start withdrawing troops from the relief efforts to feed and house more than 1 million refugees, the U.S. Pacific commander said Thursday. Aid organizations responded to the announcement by Adm. Thomas Fargo by pledging to shoulder a greater share of the burden to aid tsunami survivors...
Indonesia addition raises tsunami death toll to 221,100
(01/20/05) JAKARTA, Indonesia -- Indonesia's Health Ministry declared Wednesday that more than 70,000 people previously listed as missing are dead, significantly raising its estimate for the death toll from last month's tsunami. If confirmed, the overall tsunami death toll in 11 countries would climb to over 221,100, including 166,320 dead in Indonesia...
Parents find child stolen by tidal waves
(01/20/05) BANDA ACEH, Indonesia -- The last time Amiruddin saw his shy 7-year-old daughter was three weeks ago when the tsunami snatched her away. In the chaos of flash floods, as the family scrambled toward the roof of their home, a utility pole fell, separating Putri from her mother. "We went to the roof and I couldn't find her," said the mother, Hernini. Like her husband and many others here, she has one name...
Baby 81: Nine mothers are claiming one baby
(01/17/05) KALMUNAI, Sri Lanka -- Jenita Jeyarajah believes Baby 81 is her son, the 3-month-old infant ripped from her arms by the tsunami. So do eight other mothers. "As days and weeks pass by, the trauma of not finding their children will drive many such parents to the extreme like the one we are seeing in Kalmunai," said Maleec Calyanaratne, spokeswoman for Save the Children in Sri Lanka. "But every effort should be made to ensure that the baby goes to the rightful mother."...
NBC brings stars together for tsunami benefit
(01/16/05) LOS ANGELES -- With Norah Jones singing "we're all in this thing together," movie and music stars contributed their talents for a hastily arranged benefit for tsunami victims televised live on Saturday. The two-hour program aired on NBC Universal-owned stations, with all donations going to the American Red Cross International Response Fund...
Indonesia faces new health risk- malaria
(01/14/05) and Jim Gomez ~ The Associated Press BANDA ACEH, Indonesia -- Health officials plan to go door to door and tent to tent with mosquito-killing spray guns beginning today to head off a looming threat that one expert says could kill 100,000 more people around the tsunami disaster zone: malaria...
Tsunami victim adrift 15 days 'not prepared to die'
(01/12/05) n That morning, when the ground began to shake, Ari was on a scaffolding, hammering nails into a plank, part of a crew building a beach home in Aceh Jaya, a town about 150 miles from the Indonesian provincial capital Banda Aceh. Frightened, the crew moved away from the house and squatted in the sand...
A flood of support for victims of tsunami
(01/11/05) Students at May Watts Elementary School in Chicago held an emergency meeting last week to discuss something that's been tugging at them since winter break: how to raise funds for tsunami victims. They considered having a hot cocoa stand or a bake sale at their school in Naperville, just outside Chicago, but settled on a "loose change" drive, which began Jan. ...
Volunteer group forming to offer disaster aid
(01/11/05) Snowbound travelers on Interstate 55 near Portageville, Mo., found emergency shelter there thanks to a new disaster relief unit that is forming in Missouri. The U.S. Disaster Relief Command is an military-structured organization that aids victims of natural or man-made disaster. ...
Tsunami aid focus shifts to feeding
(01/09/05) BANDA ACEH, Indonesia -- Rescue workers pulled thousands more rotting corpses from the mud and debris of flattened towns along the Sumatran coast Saturday, two weeks after surging walls of water caused unprecedented destruction on the shores of the Indian Ocean. The death toll in 11 countries passed 150,000...
Schools and churches finding ways to raise money for tsunami victims
(01/09/05) Area efforts to help victims of last month's tsunamis in Asia range from school drives to Sunday collections at churches. Notre Dame Regional High School students raised $5,600 by allowing students to wear plain clothes instead of uniforms in return for a donation. The money will help a Franciscan orphanage in Sri Lanka that, while undamaged by the tsunami, now houses 3,000 refugees...
Dignitaries look at wave damage as donors' conference opens
(01/06/05) JAKARTA, Indonesia -- Australia promised $810 million -- the largest government pledge -- to the tsunami relief effort, topping a $674 million German aid package as a crucial donors' conference opened today with world governments focusing on how best to spend the money and get the aid to the neediest...
Tsunamis' impact felt locally
(01/05/05) Amila Ramanayake didn't read about the mountainous tidal waves that stormed the shores of South Asia in the newspaper. The 26-year-old Sri Lanka native and Southeast Missouri State University student didn't see images on a TV screen of hundreds of people -- mostly children -- being tugged kicking and screaming from land out to sea and certain death...
Tsunami survivors jam hospitals
(01/05/05) BANDA ACEH, Indonesia -- Haggard and dehydrated survivors of Asia's tsunami catastrophe flooded hospitals in the disaster zone Tuesday, posing a new challenge for the global relief operation. A 5.8-magnitude quake, the latest of numerous aftershocks stemming from the monstrous temblor that spawned the tsunami, rattled India's Andaman Islands early today. There were no immediate reports of further injury or damage in the region, which was hard hit by the killer waves...
Colin Powell touring tsunami countries, says relief going well
(01/04/05) BANGKOK, Thailand -- Secretary of State Colin Powell sought to reassure Asian leaders on a tour to inspect tsunami damage that the United States is in solidarity in helping the region recover. "The United States will certainly not turn away from those in desperate need," Powell told leaders in Thailand...
U.S. leads tsunami relief effort
(01/04/05) KARIM RAJIA, Indonesia -- U.S. helicopters rescued dozens of desperate and weak tsunami survivors, including a young girl clutching a stuffed Snoopy dog, as the American military relief operation reached out to remote areas of Indonesia with cartons of food and water on Monday...
Former presidents to lead fund drive for tsunami victims
(01/04/05) WASHINGTON -- President Bush enlisted two former presidents for an ambitious private fund-raising drive for victims of the deadly tsunami on Monday, asking Americans to open their wallets to help the millions left homeless, hungry and injured. "The devastation in the region defies comprehension," Bush said as he announced the campaign to be led by his father and Bill Clinton. "I ask every American to contribute as they are able to do so."...
Churches plan aid for tsunami victims
(01/03/05) Area churches are planning their approaches for helping with tsunami relief efforts. Because disaster relief organizations are mostly appealing for cash donations, money is the immediate approach. Within the first week of a disaster "you just don't know what to do," said Mike Shupert, interim pastor of First Baptist Church of Cape Girardeau...
Athletes, teams, fans pull together to help victims
(01/03/05) NFL teams joined Venus Williams, Maria Sharapova and other sports figures around the world in assisting the disaster relief mission for the tsunami-earthquake catastrophe with a death toll that is expected to reach 150,000. The Baltimore Ravens collected $51,475 from fans at their game against the visiting Miami Dolphins on Sunday, with the team adding another $25,000. ...
Totals for foreign victims also increasing
(01/03/05) The tally of foreigners confirmed dead from the quake and tsunamis throughout southern Asia, according to their countries' foreign ministries. Figures also include the most recent available numbers of missing based on the estimates by some government officials and agencies...
Tamil Tigers dispense aid with authoritarian efficiency
(01/03/05) KILINOCHCHI, Sri Lanka -- In times of crisis, envy the authoritarians. Veterans of a long guerrilla war, the Tamil rebels who control northern Sri Lanka moved with military precision to help victims of the Indian Ocean tsunami. The speed and efficiency of the massive humanitarian operation showed an administrative capability that underscored the rebels' demand for Tamil independence from the Sinhalese-dominated southern part of Sri Lanka...
Anguished parents watch ocean hoping children wash ashore
(01/03/05) NAVALADY BEACH, Sri Lanka -- As dawn breaks over Sri Lanka's coast, dozens of parents come to the beach where huge waves seized their children a week ago. "They believe their kids are alive and the sea will return them -- one day," UNICEF chief Carol Bellamy said on Sunday, after touring this island country's tsunami-devastated shore...
Mother could only save two of three children, so dog stepped in
(01/03/05) Chris Tomlinson The Associated Press CHINNAKALAPET, India -- "Run away!" her husband screamed from a rooftop after he spotted the colossal waves. The command was simple but it presented Sangeeta with a dilemma: She had three sons and only two arms. She ...
American helicopters lead aid operation
(01/03/05) ABOARD THE USS ABRAHAM LINCOLN -- One of the largest U.S. military relief operations in history helped speed the pace of aid to desperate victims of Asia's tsunami disaster Sunday, delivering critical supplies to haggard survivors in severe need of food and water...
Asia rescuers turn their focus to food, water
(01/03/05) BANDA ACEH, Indonesia -- A Sumatran fisherman was discovered barely alive under his beached boat Sunday -- the first survivor found in three days, but with tens of thousands still missing in crushed seaside settlements and in the flotsam washing the shores of the Indian Ocean, rescuers turned full attention to getting food and water to the living...
Americans get creative to help tsunami victims
(01/02/05) BOSTON -- A Kentucky widow, moved by the cries of grief she heard in reports about the tsunami disaster in south Asia, invited her entire town to a New Year's Eve bash to raise money for the victims. In California, a college offered free basketball tickets, with a gift for relief efforts the only price of admission...
Heavy rains plague Asian tsunami victims as relief efforts step
(01/02/05) Chris Brummit The Associated Press BANDA ACEH, Indonesia -- After the devastation wreaked by the seas, a deluge from the skies deepened the misery for tsunami-stricken areas Saturday, triggering flash floods in Sri Lanka that sent evacuees fleeing and...
Tsunami aftermath
(01/02/05) One of the things that makes disaster movies bearable is the notion that viewers go to the climate-controlled safety of a dark theater to witness horrors they believe will never actually occur. So while special effects make the volcanoes, avalanches, floods, earthquakes and towering infernos seem real, they are, in fact, not real at all...
World's New Year's celebrations more prayer than party
(01/02/05) The Associated Press PARIS -- For Sweden's prime minister, celebrating New Year's after the devastating earthquake and tsunami in Asia felt "completely wrong." Paris draped black cloth along the Champs-Elysees. Elsewhere, prayers substituted for parties...
Misery's company
(12/31/04) TEHRAN, Iran -- The people of Bam, an Iranian town devastated by an earthquake a year ago, know what's ahead for the survivors of the Indian Ocean tsunami: broken hearts, slow rebuilding and unfulfilled promises of aid. But Bam presents itself as proof of man's capacity to overcome...
Indonesian earthquake caused underground water ripples in Mo.
(12/31/04) David A. Lieb The Associated Press JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. -- The earthquake that triggered deadly tsunamis in south Asia and eastern Africa caused ripples in underground water as far away as Missouri. Shock waves from the 9.0 magnitude earthquake in the...
Tsunamideath toll reaches 119,000
(12/31/04) BANDA ACEH, Indonesia -- Pilots dropped food to Indonesian villagers stranded among bloating corpses Thursday, while police in a devastated provincial capital stripped looters of their clothing and forced them to sit on the street as a warning to others. The death toll topped 119,000, and officials warned that 5 million people lack clean water, shelter, food, sanitation and medicine...
World's tidal wave relief work bogs down
(12/30/04) BANDA ACEH, Indonesia -- As the world scrambled to the rescue, survivors fought over packs of noodles in quake-stricken Indonesian streets Wednesday while relief supplies piled up at the airport for lack of cars, gas or passable roads to move them. The official death toll across 11 countries soared past 77,000 and the Red Cross predicted it could exceed 100,000...
Technology helps effort to locate those lost in disaster
(12/30/04) STOCKHOLM, Sweden -- On hundreds of Web sites worldwide, the messages are brief but poignant: "Missing: Christina Blomee in Khao Lak" or "Where are you?" Some are nothing more than names, ages, nationalities. Others list details of where loved ones were last seen. Some have pictures of the missing...
Tsunamis impact physician in Cape
(12/29/04) Halfway around the world from the death and destruction, a jolt of fear coursed through Ismeth Abbas as he watched the results of Sunday's tsunamis play out on television. "It was scary," said Abbas, a Cape Girardeau doctor. "I saw on the news the pictures, and I knew it was India by the cars and the people."...
Tens of thousands still missing in Asia
(12/29/04) BANDA ACEH, Indonesia -- Thousands of bodies lay rotting and unidentified on lawns and streets of battered Sumatra island Wednesday and authorities called out bulldozers to dig mass graves, as the number killed in a mammoth earthquake and tsunami soared above 58,000 with tens of thousands still missing. The U.N. health agency warned that disease could double the toll yet again...
Asian disaster could change course of long-running conflicts
(12/29/04) JAKARTA, Indonesia -- The massive earthquake and tsunamis that devastated Asia raised hopes for change in two of the world's longest-running civil wars. But while warring sides in Indonesia's Aceh province immediately agreed to put hostilities on hold, government and rebel spokesmen in ethnically divided Sri Lanka accused each other of mishandling the response to the disaster...
Uncle reunited with boy found wandering Thai resort alone
(12/29/04) PHUKET, Thailand -- A 2-year-old boy who was found dazed and alone on a roadside in the wasteland of a tsunami-devastated Thai resort was reunited Tuesday with his uncle, who spotted the child's picture on the Internet. The boy, identified by his uncle as Hannes Bergstroem, was found Sunday night on a road in Phang Nga province near the beach resort of Khao Lak, about 60 miles from the island of Phuket. ...
Economies of nations hit by disaster expected to pull through
(12/29/04) WASHINGTON -- The earthquake and tsunamis that hit Asian countries will deal a fresh blow to the tourism industry there but aren't expected to produce crippling economic problems in the region or in the United States, economists say. Private economists were scrambling to assess the economic toll of Sunday's deadly natural disaster. ...
A generation of young Asians is lost in an epic disaster
(12/28/04) CUDDALORE, India -- The buzz of grim conversation in the darkened morgue was broken by a man's shriek as the small body was lowered on a bed. "My son, my king!" wailed Venkatesh, hugging the limp, shrouded bundle. Thousands of miles away in Indonesia, farmer Yusya Yusman aimlessly searched the beaches for his two children lost in Sunday's tsunami. "My life is over," he said emotionlessly...
Huge relief effort begins in Asian disaster
(12/28/04) A Red Cross spokeswoman said money is the best donation because clothing and food are too costly to ship. By Scott Moyers ~ The Southeast Missourian Americans wanting to help the mind-numbing number of Asians whose lives were shattered by Sunday's massive earthquake and subsequent tsunamis may only have one question...
The rising death toll
(12/28/04) More than 22,000 people were reported dead across 10 countries in southern Asia and Africa after massive tsunami waves smashed coastlines Sunday morning in the aftermath of the largest earthquake in 40 years. The death toll so far: * Somalia: Hundreds killed...
Asian death toll over 22,000
(12/28/04) GALLE, Sri Lanka -- Bodies washed up on tropical beaches and piled up in hospitals Monday, raising fears of disease across a 10-nation arc of destruction left by a monster earthquake and walls of water that killed more than 22,000 people. Thousands were missing and millions homeless...
Tidal wave kills 13,000 in Asia
(12/27/04) COLOMBO, Sri Lanka -- An earthquake of epic power struck deep beneath the Indian Ocean on Sunday, unleashing 20-foot tidal waves that ravaged coasts across thousands of miles and killed nearly 13,340 people. Legions of rescuers spread across Asia, searching for survivors and rushing aid to the hundreds of thousands injured or left homeless...
Hardest hit areas not covered by tsunami warning system
(12/27/04) The catastrophic death toll in Asia caused by a massive tsunami might have been reduced had India and Sri Lanka been part of an international warning system designed to warn coastal communities about potentially deadly waves, scientists say. Some 6,800 people in India and Sri Lanka were among the more than 11,000 people killed after being hit by walls of water triggered by a tremendous earthquake early Sunday off Sumatra...
Survivors describe fear, tragedy after massive tidal wave
(12/27/04)
Editor's note: The following contains snapshots from the five countries hardest-hit by Sunday's earthquake and tsunami waves. ** Sri Lanka AMBLANGODA, Sri Lanka -- The twisted limbs of the frail-bodied girl were caught in a garden fence near the sea. She may have died, but no one stopped -- there was already too much tragedy around her to check... |