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December 31, 2004

The ocean tried to warn us, but we just didn't get it

Topics: Southeast Asia Earthquake and Tsunami

The Australian January 01, 2005

A TSUNAMI announces its arrival. It does not creep up ashamed in silence to catch its victims unaware. It gallops, tail high, across the sea like a platoon of soldiers drunk on the excitement of being on the right side of an uneven fight.

It even sends an advance scout or two, smaller big waves that come from nowhere and then immediately retreat, leaving hundreds of metres of exposed sand as they collect water to feed the growing beast.

So, on Golden Buddha Beach last Sunday morning, on a barely inhabited island 200km north of Phuket, we were warned.

The warnings hadn't come from police, or seismologists, or even fishing boats far out to sea: they had come from the ocean itself.

The thing is, we didn't get it. Sure, most of the 150 guests and staff at our resort rushed to the beach as the first smaller big wave hit the sand, and then noticed the 3cm-high white horse on the horizon. But for most of us, our initial reaction was to collect cameras and wait for the spectacle.
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Posted by Hyscience at December 31, 2004 10:32 PM

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