5 years after
Posted: Sat Dec 26, 2009 3:57 pm
Not that current, but still worth a thread imo.
On December 26th in 2004, my family was staying in Bangkok, Thailand as we accompanied my Dad, an airline pilot, for his worktrip.
It was supposed to be a nice short holiday for us, but it turned out to be nothing like it.
Even though Bangkok is far away from the area where the tsunami hit, the effect was seen in Bangkok too. The hysteria among the people, everyone was talking about it, having their own guesses on what had happened. Every TV channel was talking about it. What I found to be the most frightening was the death toll rising by 10,000 every hour. The footage taken by the tourists and locals was something uindescribable too.
Then it hit hard on my family. We heard that close friends of ours, a whole family, was reported missing. My sister was in total panic, since her very best friend was there.
Lots of phone calls trying to find out their status. Of course, it was useless, since everyone else was trying to do the same, but there wasn't really anything else to do.
Our holiday was to last 4-5 days, but it ended up being only 2 days. My Dad made a lot of arrengements and phone calls to change his flight to leave couple of days earlier, and to transform the plane into an evacuation friendly form. When we were at the airport, about to leave back home, the sight was terrifying. People in minimum clothes with lots of bruises and wounds, stretchers with people in weak conditions. And in addition to all the injuries, almost every one of them had lost someone out there.
There was also this one 10-year-old boy in a stretcher, who had lost his whole family, parents and two brothers. My Dad was with him the majority of the flight, leaving the flight duties to co-pilots. Today, after five years, my Dad still visits him every once in a while in his new family.
The close family friends of ours, only the teenage boy survived. His stories of survival were horrendous to hear.
That day was one of the worst in my life, and a day I'll never forget.
All the best wishes to the people who lost someone out there.
On December 26th in 2004, my family was staying in Bangkok, Thailand as we accompanied my Dad, an airline pilot, for his worktrip.
It was supposed to be a nice short holiday for us, but it turned out to be nothing like it.
Even though Bangkok is far away from the area where the tsunami hit, the effect was seen in Bangkok too. The hysteria among the people, everyone was talking about it, having their own guesses on what had happened. Every TV channel was talking about it. What I found to be the most frightening was the death toll rising by 10,000 every hour. The footage taken by the tourists and locals was something uindescribable too.
Then it hit hard on my family. We heard that close friends of ours, a whole family, was reported missing. My sister was in total panic, since her very best friend was there.
Lots of phone calls trying to find out their status. Of course, it was useless, since everyone else was trying to do the same, but there wasn't really anything else to do.
Our holiday was to last 4-5 days, but it ended up being only 2 days. My Dad made a lot of arrengements and phone calls to change his flight to leave couple of days earlier, and to transform the plane into an evacuation friendly form. When we were at the airport, about to leave back home, the sight was terrifying. People in minimum clothes with lots of bruises and wounds, stretchers with people in weak conditions. And in addition to all the injuries, almost every one of them had lost someone out there.
There was also this one 10-year-old boy in a stretcher, who had lost his whole family, parents and two brothers. My Dad was with him the majority of the flight, leaving the flight duties to co-pilots. Today, after five years, my Dad still visits him every once in a while in his new family.
The close family friends of ours, only the teenage boy survived. His stories of survival were horrendous to hear.
That day was one of the worst in my life, and a day I'll never forget.
All the best wishes to the people who lost someone out there.