4th Anniversary of Indian Ocean Tsunami of 2004
Friday, December 26, 2008
Tallahassee, FL, USA
(The town square in Vedaraniam just few hours after the tsunami has hit Vedaraniam. Only few hours earlier this place was chaotic with people streaming inland. This place is approximately 4 km inland and right in front of my father's house. This photos was taken on Sunday, December 26, 2004, 1:30 PM IST.)
(A fishing boat has been carried almost 1 1/2 kilometers inland and lodged in a thazham bush in Vedaraniam during the tsunami that has hit Vedaraniam yesterday. The photos was taken on Monday, December 27, 2004, 9:00 AM IST. One day after the tsunami has hit the shores.)
This morning (in the United States, but it was four years ago the same time, in India) was just as cloudy and muggy here in Tallahassee as was in Vedaraniam on Sunday, December 26, 2004. Around 9:15 -:30 AM IST the skies went bit darker, house flies started to land in larger numbers (despite the fact it was middle of winter), the power went out suddenly (not a surprise) as we were having showers to get ready for our impending visit to Nattu Mada Mariamman Temple. Sweet pongal and regular lentil pongal were already prepared for the offering to the Godess.
All the siblings from our family had gathered on the day. We had abondanded the plan to visit to the beaches (What a God's gift to our family!!) since during the previous weeks it had rained plenty and as Vedaraniam, Agasthiampalli, and Kodiakarai. And our soil swampy with lots of clay content made it unattractive for the kids and adults to the enjoy the beaches.
About 1/2 hour earlier we heard in the TV News that there were some mild tremors in Chennai city. Just then we started to hear crowd noise on the streets and there was big commotion with people running on the streets shouting, "the sea is coming", "the sea is coming (kadal varuthu, kadal pongi varuthu | கடல் வருது! கடல் பொங்கி வருது!!). Thus started the day that will take several lives in my town of Vedaraniam. I spent several minutes today thinking about how lucky we were on that day and prayed for those who perished on that fateful day.
The earth quake responsible for the tsunami happened in Indonesia in Sumatra at 7:58:53 AM Java/Sumatra time (00:58:53 UTC or 06:28:53 AM IST). It took about 3 hours for the waves that were generated by the earth quake to arrive in the Indian shores. That would make it around 09:30:00 AM IST.
