Storm fears overshadow Indian coast decades after tsunami

The deadly tsunami that flooded India’s southern coast two decades ago was a one-off disaster, but increasingly intense storms trigger panic every time howling gales whip up waves.

Maragathavel Lakshmi shudders when she hears rain or strong winds, remembering how her daughter was swept away when the 2004 tsunami, triggered by a massive earthquake off the coast of Indonesia, crashed onto the coast almost without warning.

“Weather alerts have made life easier, but the fear of heavy rain or strong winds is still there,” said Lakshmi, 45.

More than 220,000 people were killed when the devastating waves hit the Indian Ocean coast, including 16,389 in India, according to the international disaster database EM-DAT.

Climate fear is based on a very real threat – and the risks are increasing.

Dangerous cyclones, the equivalent of hurricanes in the North Atlantic or typhoons in the Pacific Northwest, pose an annual threat.

Better forecasting and more effective evacuation planning have dramatically reduced the death toll, but scientists say man-made climate change is intensifying their power.

“The summers are very harsh now and the rains are heavier,” said Lakshmi, saying the weather alerts made her anxiety skyrocket.

A warmer atmosphere holds more water, which means more rainfall.

“The strong winds scare us,” said her husband Maragathavel, who, like many in the region, goes by only one name.

“Every time it rains a lot, our area gets flooded,” added the 49-year-old fisherman. “It seems these days that the sea has still not left us.”

“Very scared”

The disaster of December 26, 2004 was not caused by climate change but by a 9.1 magnitude earthquake that struck the Indonesian region of Sumatra.

A few hours later, Lakshmi heard a loud rumble, then saw huge waves – rising up to 40 meters (130 feet) – approaching her neighborhood on the coast of Akkaraipettai, their local village. State of Tamil Nadu.

Lakshmi showed a photo of her daughter Yashoda, who was looked after by her father since the day the waves hit.

“She would have been 22 now,” Lakshmi said through tears.

The 45-year-old remembers people being swept away or clinging to whatever they could.

“Some people were naked or had almost no clothes on,” she said.

The tsunami also hit the Andaman and Nicobar Island chain, where at least 4,000 people were killed. The victims included 109 Indian Air Force pilots and crew members and around 40 of their relatives.

At least 870,000 people are homeless in India.

Many, like Lakshmi, were moved to new settlements inland.

Their neighbor, fisherman P. Mohan, 46, said the weather warnings still gave him shivers of fear.

“If I see a warning about the weather, I don’t even leave the house,” he said.

“Until the rains or the cyclone – whatever the warning is – comes and goes, I am very scared.”

“I can’t control nature”

Mohan had a rod put in his leg after he was injured in the tsunami, which also killed his mother.

Neighbors had last seen her sitting by the sea when the waves were crashing.

He could not identify her from the “swollen and disfigured” corpses submitted for identification in the days following the tsunami.

“Was she buried with other people who could not be identified? Is her body still in the sea?” he asked. “I don’t know.”

Some friends told him that they could have seen his mother’s body among other unidentified corpses.

It took him a decade to fully accept his loss and hold the symbolic final rites.

A dike made of concrete and bricks from houses destroyed by the tsunami now separates the land from the water.

Villagers pray every day at a temple dedicated to a Hindu deity believed to protect them from the sea.

But Mohan said he now simply accepts his fate.

“God cannot control nature,” he said. “What must happen will come.”

© 2024 AFP