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One of the greatest natural disasters in human history took place less than 21 years ago. While people in many parts of the world were spending a peaceful and safe second Christmas in their homes, the Indian Ocean was hit by the apocalypse in the form of the biggest tsunami in 600 years.
Sumatra in Indonesia lies almost at the interface of two tectonic plates – the Indian Plate and the small Burma Plate. The mutual stress of these two tectonic plates under the ocean floor caused a massive earthquake of 9.1 on the Richter scale at Christmas 2004.
The energy released by this earthquake was so enormous that it must have accumulated over hundreds of years. The force of the earthquake itself can be compared to 23,000 Hiroshima-type atomic bombs. The intensity of the earthquake was so great that it affected the entire planet. It moved the Earth’s north pole almost 2.5 centimetres eastwards and shortened the duration of the day by 2.68 microseconds.
The tsunami had a catastrophic impact on the entire Indian Ocean. The town of Banda Aceh at the northern tip of Sumatra was closest to the epicentre of the earthquake. The first waves arrived there just 20 minutes after the earthquake began. The next affected area was Thailand. The waves moved across the Indian Ocean at 800 km per hour and hit the coast of Phang Nga and Phuket province an hour and a half later.
Another hour later, the tsunami struck on the opposite side of the Indian Ocean on the south-east coast of India near the city of Chennai. One of the hardest hit areas was also Sri Lanka. That the tsunami was of record-breaking power is evidenced by the fact that the last victims died almost eight hours later when wild waves unexpectedly surprised swimmers in South Africa, some 5,000 kilometres away from the quake’s epicentre. The tsunami also hit Malaysia, Tanzania and the Maldives.
━━ A huge wave swept away almost everything in its path.
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The damage caused by the tsunami in the affected areas was of enormous proportions. It left more than 460 000 houses damaged or irreparably destroyed. Infrastructure, businesses, hotels and thriving communities were destroyed. The devastating waves also had a very negative impact on the environment, particularly on soil, vegetation and crops. Overall, the damage was estimated at approximately $13 billion. Indonesia was the worst affected country, with damage totalling almost $6 million.
The Indian Ocean tsunami is rightly considered the deadliest tsunami in human history. It claimed over 230,000 victims. The largest city in the Indonesian province of Banda Aceh suffered huge losses. The tidal wave there killed a quarter of the city’s population. The coastal town of Lhoknga, south-west of Banda Aceh, fared much worse. The tsunami razed the town to the ground and only 400 of its 7 000 inhabitants survived. In Sri Lanka, it caused the worst railway disaster in history when a giant wave threw a train off the tracks, killing 1 700 people.
