Families of Boxing Day tsunami victims weep as they mark 20th anniversary of one of the world’s worst natural disasters
MOURNERS wept today as they marked the 20th anniversary of the Boxing Day tsunami which killed 230,000.
They gathered along shores to honour those who died when huge waves triggered by a 9.2-magnitude underwater earthquake hit land.
At least 150 Britons died after the third most powerful tremor ever recorded struck off the Indonesian island of Sumatra in 2004 and triggered one of the deadliest natural disasters.
More than 170,000 people died in Indonesia, where waves were over 100ft high on landfall.
Parts of India, Sri Lanka and Thailand were also devastated and more than 1.7million people lost their homes.
John May’s backpacking daughter, Lisa, 25, of Cheltenham, Gloucs, was among the victims. He flew to Thailand in its wake to find her body and bring it home.
He said: “It seems almost as real today as it was all those years ago. Lisa will always be in our hearts and remain forever young.”
Dorothy Wilkinson, 56, whose partner and his parents were killed in Thailand, said of attending a memorial event: “It makes me happy to come . . . a bit sad. It’s celebrating their life.”
British surfer Daniel Poole, 44, was in Sri Lanka when the waves crashed into the guest house he was sharing with his now wife.
He said: “I leapt out of bed to the window to see a great wall of white water, as tall as our single-storey building, rolling up and then crashing up the beach.
“The last I saw of that room was the roof dropping down on us before we were washed out through the rear wall, across a ditch, road and 150 metres into the jungle before surfacing again.”
In Banda Aceh, Indonesia, one of the worst-hit areas, sirens sounded for three minutes to mark the time the earthquake began.
Nearby, at a mass grave where 14,000 unidentified victims are buried, mourners paid their respects.
Muhamad Amirudin, who lost two children, said: “We miss them. We still don’t know where they are.”