Looting starts as tsunami death toll rises
Indonesia
Residents of Palu, on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi, turned to looting yesterday) as they struggled to survive in the aftermath of a deadly 7.5 magnitude earthquake and tsunami that has so far killed 832 people.
Looters were spotted taking items from the damaged Ramayana shopping mall and plundering fuel stations.
One earthquake survivor told The Daily Telegraph that he had been woken up by a noisy crowd ransacking his local mini-market.
‘‘Without justifying it, I understand why,’’ said the man, who identified himself as Suwanto. ‘‘My wife told me last night that our food supplies will last only two days. The big problem is clean water.’’
Joko Widodo, the Indonesian president, who visited Palu yesterday, urged residents to be patient.
Electricity has been cut off and fuel is in short supply in the worst affected areas around Palu and the town of Donggala. Damage to the runway and control tower at Palu airport has hampered both aid and the rescue efforts. Roads into the area have also been severely damaged. The full extent of the devastation in Sulawesi has not yet been revealed as rescue teams are still struggling to reach the worstaffected areas.
Officials have warned that the death toll could rise into the thousands and announced mass burials yesterday in a desperate attempt to stave off disease.
Indonesia’s disaster authorities are now under scrutiny after scientists were taken by surprise by the tsunami, which reportedly reached 20ft in height and hit the coastline at speeds in the hundreds of kilometres per hour.
The approach of the unexpected killer wave was caught in a chilling video on social media. Like a scene from a horror movie, a man screams desperately to warn people loitering on the beachfront street below.
From his standpoint a few stories above, he can see the surge of water but people are slow to react, their view blocked by beach huts. Cars drive past with no urgency, seemingly unaware.
The man cries louder, but as the murky waters hit with brutal force, submerging the huts and wreaking havoc, his voice breaks into sobs as those he tried to save run belatedly for the stairs. Noticeably absent from the video is the sound of a tsunami warning siren, which could have saved lives.
It emerged yesterday that a life-saving early warning system had been stalled for five years. Sea floor sensors and fibre-optic cable were supposed to replace a system set up after an earthquake and tsunami killed nearly 250,000 people in the region in 2004. But delays in getting funding means it hasn’t moved past the prototype phase.