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Latest news from the Indonesia Earthquake & Tsunamis.

CLAIM: '400,000 DEAD' IN INDONESIA ALONE (UNCONFIRMED)
souce : Drudge Report
The death toll in Acheh, the region worst hit by last Sunday's tsunami, may exceed 400,000 as many affected areas could still not be reached for search and rescue operations, Indonesia's Ambassador to Malaysia Drs H. Rusdihardjo said Thursday.

Aid Arrives in Asia As Deaths Near 150,000
Tsunami Toll Jumps to Over 125,000, Fear Lingers
Tsunami toll reaches 123,000
-=> Tsunami Death Toll Jumps Over 120,000

(Banda Aceh from Space - before and After)

The death toll from the Indian Ocean disaster rose dramatically today to 123,000 after Indonesia raised its number of victims by more than 30,000. The Indonesian government estimated the country's death toll at 79,940, with officials warning that the body count is still far from complete. Unicef said that close to a million Indonesian children were in need. Indonesia's Aceh province on the island of Sumatra - the landmass closest to the epicentre of Sunday's seismic activity - bore the brunt of both the 9.0 magnitude earthquake and the subsequent tsunamis.

Aid workers arriving in region have encountered devastation - entire towns and villages razed, and countless people - some of them with cuts and broken bones - searching desperately for clean water and food on streets covered in debris and dead bodies.  Emergency workers and soldiers have come across countless bloated bodies, many of them young children, strewn on the streets and floating in the rivers of Banda Aceh, the provincial capital.

Some survivors have not eaten since Sunday and now risk infections and diseases such as elephantiasis, cholera, typhoid, hepatitis, bronchitis, pneumonia, malaria, meningitis and haemorrhagic fever.

Fights have reportedly have broken out in the streets of Banda Aceh over packets of noodles dropped from military vehicles.

Unicef, the international children's agency, estimated that 60% of Banda Aceh has been destroyed, along with severe damage across the north-west coast. Government institutions have stopped functioning and basic supplies have almost run out, forcing even ambulances to ration fuel. Military helicopter pilots struggled to drop food into isolated villages surrounded by cliffs along the coast of Sumatra, as shortages and the fear of disease spread.

"Everything here has collapsed," said Brig Gen Achmad, surgeon general of Indonesia's armed forces. "Even the government has collapsed. The hospitals, medical services are in disarray.

About 2,600 Americans Unaccounted for After Tsunami
About 2,600 Americans are still unaccounted for after last week's Asian tsunami but the list of missing is dwindling fast as more people are found safe, a senior State Department official said on Thursday.

-=> 11 U.S. Citizens Killed in Asia Tsunamis
-=> Thousands of Americans missing
-=> Echoes of 9/11 in hunt for loved ones



'From one end to another, Leupueng has vanished as if it never existed'
Leupueng has been obliterated. Of this town of 10,000 people, nothing vertical and square-edged is left. From one end to another, Leupueng and most of its inhabitants have vanished as if they never were.

WHO: Disease Could Double Asia Death Toll...
"The initial terror associated with the tsunamis and the earthquake itself may be dwarfed by the longer term suffering of the affected communities," Nabarro warned.

WHO Scrambles To Curb Outbreaks
Disease continues to threaten tsunami-hit areas, even though no outbreaks have been reported so far. WHO is seeking $60 million to restore basic needs to as many as 150,000 at-risk people to further stem the spread of infectious diseases.

Five million people in 11 countries lack the basic requirements for life
The death toll from the south Asian tsunami is likely to surpass 120,000, aid agencies warned yesterday as the first consignments from the biggest relief operation in history began to arrive to help survivors in the devastated region. The United Nations said at least £1bn in emergency aid was needed after it calculated that the Boxing Day disaster left up to five million people across 11 countries without access to the basic requirements for life - water, food and sanitation. Other aid agencies said that four days after the earthquake deep under the Indian Ocean, it was clear that the international community must now cope with death on a vast scale.

Millions of survivors at risk
As the death toll from the devastating earthquake and tsunami in the Indian Ocean continues to mount, relief officials are scrambling to provide critical aid to millions of survivors who lack basic necessities.

Tsunami: Why America's Coast Would Be Toast
It sounds like the plot of a fanciful Hollywood disaster movie. A dangerous volcano in the Canary Islands erupts, sends a giant tsunami travelling faster than a jet aircraft into the major population centres of America's east coast, killing tens of millions and wiping out New York and Washington DC. But unlike the eruption in the 1997 film Volcano (which threatened in its tagline that 'the coast is toast') scientists believe the threat from the volcano of Cumbre Vieja on the island of La Palma is real, and that it could send a massive slab of rock twice the size of the Isle of Man crashing into the Atlantic.

Quake's Power: 1 Million A-Bombs
The earthquake that spawned the deadly tidal waves that devastated the coasts of Asia started as an earthquake 6 miles beneath the ocean floor. One scientist says likened the quake's power to detonating a million atomic bombs.

Quake may have made Earth wobble
The deadly Asian earthquake may have permanently accelerated the Earth's rotation -- shortening days by a fraction of a second -- and caused the planet to wobble on its axis, U.S. scientists said Tuesday.

U.N.: Tsunami toll worse than Bam quake
-=> ONE YEAR TO THE HOUR AFTER 'BAM' DISASTER...

Thousands of soldiers searched Asia's shorelines Monday for survivors of devastating tidal waves that devistated seaside towns in nine countries, killing at least 140,500 people, and possibly going as high as 175,000. Aid poured into the region, and parents in India mourned as hundreds of children were buried in mass graves.

As I read, the death toll began climbing sharply right after Sunday morning's 9.0-magnitude quake that struck deep beneath the Indian Ocean off the shoreline of Indonesia, the most powerful temblor in four decades.  The initial reports were bad... what we have learned since then is even worse...

The waves jolted away from the epicenter at over 400 mph before crashing into the surrounding shorelines without any kind of warning, sweeping people off the beaches, and taking entire villages out to sea. Millions were displaced from their homes and thousands are still missing.

There is also a new risk, and many have warned that disease outbreaks were possible.

What other kind of damage can earthquakes cause?

The method for measuring the shaking effect and damage is what is known as the Richter Scale. The Richter magnitude scale is a mathematical technique used to quantify the size of earthquakes. Developed in 1935 by Charles Richter in collaboration with Beno Gutenberg, both of the California Institute of Technology, the Richter scale assigns a single number to quantify the size of an earthquake. Here's what the scale looks like.

• Less than 2.0 - Microearthquakes, not felt.- About 8,000 per year
• 2.0-2.9 - Generally not felt, but recorded - No damages - About 1,000 per year
• 3.0-3.9 - Often felt, but rarely causes damage.- 49,000 per year (estimated)
• 4.0-4.9 - Noticeable shaking of indoor items, rattling noises. Significant damage unlikely. - 6,200 per year(estimated)
• 5.0-5.9 - Can cause major damage to poorly constructed buildings over small regions. At most slight damage to well-designed buildings.- 800 per year
• 6.0-6.9 - Can be destructive in areas up to about 100 miles across in populated areas.- 120 per year
• 7.0-7.9 - Can cause serious damage over larger areas. Skyscrapers as risk. 18 per year
• 8.0 or greater - Can cause serious damage in areas several hundred miles across. Building structures collapse - skyscrapers as SERIOUS risk. Average 1-2 / per year

I have also read The magnitude 9.0 earthquake off Indonesia moved the island of Sumatra about 100 feet to the southwest, the Los Angeles Times reported Monday. - Washington Times