抖阴ap

Juck Chai Kiewnin, 46, casts nets from his longboat in the early hours of Dec. 26th. It’s a typical morning for him and the rest of men from Nai Rai fishing village north of Thailand’s Phuket Island.

But on this day, the sea acts strangely, rising and falling in curious ways. Kiewnin, his brother and their 72-year-old father decide to pull in their nets and return to their village – a Muslim enclave of 700 people and 107 homes.
“We know something is wrong,” Kiewnin says. “The sea went dry under the boat, and rocks appeared. Then it kept rising and rising. The place started flooding.”

Kiewnin leaps from his boat and runs to the village, about 900 feet from the sea. He yells from hut to hut that water is coming.

“Don’t grab anything,” he tells his relatives and neighbors. “Just get the kids out of here.”

Post / Helen H. Richardson

Juck Chai Kiewnin, left, talks about the tsunami as it came toward their village. His family sits next to him with the rubble and debris of their homes in the backround. They are from second left to right: Charkrin Sinkara in sarong, Visit Maisoh, 29, second from right, and Sombat Kiewnin, right in plaid sarong. Juck Chai’s mother Lima Kiewnin died in the tsunami and many of the family’s homes were destroyed.

Villagers leap onto motorcycles, pile into vehicles and head for higher ground. Kiewnin grabs his 70-year-old mother and tries to run with her in his arms. But a five-and-a-half-foot wave carrying wood and rocks overtakes him, knocking her from his grasp.

Her body is later found washed about 500 meters inland. She’s the only person in the village to die.

Most of the homes in Nai Rai, however, are destroyed. Wooden huts built on stilts become flotsam, wrapped around trees and strewn into muddy piles. Power is gone. Roads fill with debris. Most of the villagers’ boats are smashed or were carried out to sea. Only the few masonry homes and the village’s mosque survive.