Newsgroup: it.hobby.viaggi
Titolo: Messaggio dalle Maldive


      29/12/2004 16.12
Dear Bianca
Thank you for your concerned inquiry, fortunately for Asdu, the island had 
been very minimally touched by the destructive Tsunami that washed away many 
parts of the Asian Coastline.  A lot of Maldivian islands had suffered great 
loss, in some cases destruction of homes in their entirety, due to the force 
of the tidal wave.  The main airport, Male' International, had been shut 
down from around mid-morning of the fateful day, 26th December, until the 
morning of the 27th December, and is now fully functional.  Around 6 resorts 
have been totally damaged, while a lot of local fishing village islands had 
suffered between 50 to 95% damage to the entire property and buildings on 
those islands.
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At Asdu, we have been blessed by Allah to an extent that I cannot even speak 
of; we had not even experience or sighted the mass of sea water as tide or 
wave, the first waves that came our way may have been dampened and its 
height reduced when the wave approached the shallow continental shelf, and 
thereafter, its force further reduced by the main coral reef barrier that 
protects each atoll.  Since Asdu is inside an atoll, the force of the wave 
and its height may have been reduced to a great extent, while those islands 
on the outer periphery of the atolls would have experienced the actual waves 
in their full force, height and enormity.
At Asdu, we only experienced the rise of the sea level up to about 50cms on 
the ground level, and receded almost immediately, having covered 95% of the 
island for about 5 minutes.  The incoming water into the island was without 
any force; hence the water did not enter our kitchen or the stores at all, 
leaving all our food and other supplies totally intact.  As a precautionary 
measure, we had shut off the generators thereby cutting off all electricity 
for about 6 hours, so as to avoid any mishaps due electricity shortages. 
The island was never out of communication via DC power, and when electricity 
was re-commenced at sunset, all the basic services such as making of fresh 
water, flush systems and refrigeration were all back to normal.
At certain points of the island, where the ground level is lower, the water 
level rose to about 100cm, but lasted no more than 2 to 3 minutes before the 
water level receded and finally washed off the island totally within 20 
minutes.
A second tidal wave approached the island within 25 minutes, this wave, 
however, did not rise over the normal full moon high tide level; a third 
wave may have approached, but we on Asdu were not able to recognize any 
undue change in its height.
As for the effect of the Tsunami tide on Asdu, we did not even experience or 
feel the big wave that hit a lot of parts of Maldives at 0930 hrs, we only 
had a brief flooding from a small wave that came at 11.30, which I believe 
was also the effect of the pull of the moon at that time  (The fateful day 
was the full moon day, and the time we had the flooding was exactly at the 
very high tide time, at the time of very highest level of the sea for the 
whole year) apart from having covered from 6 inched to 20 inches of water in 
most of the rooms for 3 to 4 minutes, we have not had any damage to our 
property, nor were we deprived of any services thereafter.  Since the wave 
that flooded our little island was around 1130 in the morning, our food 
services were temporarily stopped, to allow the staff to attend to 
emergencies. However, lunch as usual was served to the guests in the 
restaurant at 1400 hrs.  No other services were delayed or hampered by the 
slight brace of this natural force of nature that has given us Maldivians a 
lot of grief, and we continue to serve our people by way of funds, material 
and clothing.  Apart from damage to buildings on a lot of islands, 
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"urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" />Maldives has not suffered at 
all in its reef system or its beauty of loss or damage to marine life at all 
due to the effects of the Tsunami.  And apart from the re-construction 
process for the damage, Maldives is now back to normal.
No staff or guests on Asdu were injured, and nothing was lost or damaged.  A 
negligible amount of personal belongings of the guests in their rooms, left 
at very low level, may have floated away and therefore misplaced, but to our 
knowledge it had been only one case of loss of some money left out, while 2 
or three guests' electronic equipment such as cameras or computers were 
briefly submerged in salt water.  In all, we at Asdu are thankful to Allah 
for His blessing on us, and then to our very kind guests who were 
sympathetic and understanding in time of our emergency. And we continue to 
pray for the protection and safety of all those Maldivians and our 
neighboring Sri Lankans who have suffered great losses at this time.
The fishing village in front of us (Asdu) had been very much affected by the 
tide, but no loss of lives and not even casualties, only loss of property 
and damage to simple houses on the island due to flooding, up to 4 to 5 feet 
at some places. All the women and all the children on Dhiffusi are evacuated 
to Male' and given shelter, while all the men are on the island, cleaning up 
the rubbish and restoring services such as electricity and sewage disposal.
There is nothing much any one person can do now, we are in the stage of 
re-construction, and, as you said, development of and continuation of our 
tourism will enhance this process greatly.
I am especially happy to know that you are already active in the relief 
process, and we all must thank such kind hearts all the time.
Best wishes to you both for the New Year 2005.
Rgds
Ahmed Ismail
_______________________________________________________

mezzo a questa gente meravigliosa.
Grazie, Bianca,  per aver riportato questa testimonianza.
ciao
nb
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