Death Toll thought to be 100
September 30th, 2009 at 11:09 pm by David Farrar40 dead was bad enough, but the death toll in Samoa, and to a degree Tonga, is now thought to be 100.
Around 15,000 are homeless, at least temporarily.
Samoa has a population of 179,000 so if this was NZ it is would be the equivalent of around 2,410 dead and 360,000 needing shelter.
You can donate online to the NZ Red Cross appeal here.
Tags: Samoa, Tsunami
October 1st, 2009 at 6:46 am
After a day frantically waiting for news of friends we found out last night all 4 are safe. Their resort was wiped out and they have nothing but a tale to tell.
Thank God they are alive. My thoughts are with those who have lost loved ones.
Vote:October 1st, 2009 at 7:22 am
Meanwhile, Indonesia quake kills 75, thousands trapped.
Vote:October 1st, 2009 at 7:34 am
Sheesh cha, global warming has a lot to answer for eh
Vote:October 1st, 2009 at 8:23 am
Our thoughts go out to the people of Samoa over this tragedy, the saddest thing now is seeing the Labour party send two MP’s to try and lever some political capital from this sad event.
Vote:FFS Winnie Laban as a Samoan is possibly explainable, but sending Carter WTF was Phool thinking, he would be as much use as a chocolate teapot.
Why not let the people with the experience and skills to help sort things out get on and do their jobs, instead of letting two OPPOSITION flunkys get in the way, they are only there to try and gain some political mileage from this disaster.
Next will be the Labour Co-leader “The Duck” on Red Alert crowing about how he was first to react, hopefully the nation will see this for the sham it is.
October 1st, 2009 at 8:27 am
The situation in Samoa is bad but until information becomes available we don’t know how bad. Not a time for trivialising.
I thought I would try TV1 this morning to get an update and was just reminded why I don’t usually go there. Paul Henry kept on going on about how Civil Defence didn’t know what was going on yesterday and how bad their communication was. To illustrate they replayed an interview from yesterday – except it didn’t work. Later they crossed to a phone cal with the Samoan PM to get a report – but it didn’t work. Then on to the Sumatra earthquake – a link there didn’t work. So Henry went back to criticising CD communications. At least all their garbage on a Jackson movie seemed to be available.
The only god thing about all this was the interview with Bill English who put Henry in his place saying that their were a lot more important things to be worried about at the moment. It shut him up on CD for at least five minutes.
Donating to Red Cross….
Vote:October 1st, 2009 at 8:51 am
Someone should now be asking the Minister of Transport if he still thinks it is a good idea to put the Victoria Park viaduct extension under ground below sea level, and the Waterview connection also underground below sea level.
Vote:A tsunami of this kind would both these tunnels and totally disable the two means of crossing the harbour from north to south and south to north.
What we learned (or did not learn) from Katrina was that the best means of getting people out of a city in such an event is via elevated motorways. We are putting our key links below sea level right beside the coastline in the upper area of a harbour where the surge gets multiplied by the narrowing. (See Whangarei Harbour yesterday.)
If these were kept at grade they would be cheaper – so its not money.
October 1st, 2009 at 3:06 pm
That would happen right now too. The access roads for several kilometers are very close to sea level. The south side one would most likely end up littered with boats from the marina. For that matter, the Northwestern motorway would go totally underwater from Waterview to Te Atatu. I have frequently seen waves splash up onto it, and once it was even swamped.
Vote:October 1st, 2009 at 7:18 pm
I believe the MSM have moved beyond reporting this news, and into profiteering from the human misery created by the tragedy.
Shame on you TVNZ, TV3 and Campbell Live.
Shame on you.
Vote: