Briton who died trying to save her dogs from tsunami
A BRITISH charity worker was swept to her death while trying to save her dogs after a tsunami smashed into Tonga.
Angela Glover, 50, was on a beach as waves created by a huge undersea volcanic eruption crashed into the Polynesian island where she lived.
Her husband James survived by clinging to a tree. He found her body in an area of scrubland after organising a search party, heartbroken family members said last night.
Mrs Glover is the first confirmed death from the disaster triggered by Saturday’s eruption of the Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha’apai volcano.
In an online post just hours before the tsunami struck, the former advertising worker shared a picture of a red sunset and reassured her followers that ‘everything is fine’.
She wrote: ‘I’m not kidding you, this is the sunset today after the volcano exploded last
‘Life’s dream of working in the South Pacific’
night. We’ve been under tsunami warnings today, everything’s fine.
‘A few swells, a few eerie silences, a wind or two, then silence, sudden stillness, electric storms.’ Relatives said Mrs Glover died while trying to save five of her dogs on Tongatapu, Tonga’s main island, around 40 miles from the volcano. She and her husband had been looking after a house for friends on the west coast at the time. Only one of the animals has been found alive.
Mr Glover, who owns a tattoo parlour in Tonga’s capital Nuku’alofa, returned to the couple’s home on the south coast of the island after being separated from his wife. After alerting the British High Commission, he was able to contact her family in the UK using a satellite phone supplied by the embassy.
Mrs Glover left behind a successful advertising career in London to move to Tonga in July 2016, partly inspired by her childhood dream of swimming with whales.
As well as helping to run her husband’s business, Mrs Glover set up the Tonga Animal Welfare Society, devoting herself to sheltering and rehoming stray dogs.
Nick eleini, Mrs Glover’s brother, described her as a ‘ray of light’ who had realised a lifetime dream by moving to the South Pacific.
Describing the tragedy as a ‘terrible shock’, he added: ‘She was beautiful. She was a ray of sunshine.
‘She would just walk into a room and lighten the room up and she loved her life, both when she was working in London and then she achieved her life’s dream of going to work in the South Pacific.’
Mr eleini has now flown back to the UK from his home in
Sydney to be with his mother Jennifer, 84.
Authorities have yet to confirm the number of casualties among Tonga’s 100,000strong population.
The eight-minute eruption damaged the undersea cables that supply internet to the islands and it could take weeks to fix them. Nasa images captured an ash cloud being propelled ten miles into the air with the sonic boom it created heard as far away as Alaska.
New Zealand and Australia have sent military surveillance flights to assess the damage after initially being curtailed by the ash cloud.
New Zealand prime minister Jacinda Ardern said the situation was ‘hugely concerning’, with Tonga in urgent need of water after ash contaminated supplies.