news says the waves r headed to my city now......MY FUCKING SHIT ...
Tidal waves and tremors hit Asia
Huge casualties are being reported following tidal waves and earth tremors in countries across southern and eastern Asia.
Large tidal waves striking coastal parts of Sri Lanka have reportedly killed at least 150 people.
Earlier, a massive earthquake, said to measure 8.5, hit Indonesia's Sumatra island at roughly 0800 local time.
Earth tremors have also been reported in Bangladesh, while tourist resorts in Thailand have been hit by high tides.
After the Indonesian quake, panicked people reportedly fled their homes in the towns of Medan and Banda Aceh, the capitals of two of Sumatra's provinces.
The US Geological Survey measured the quake at 8.5 magnitude.
Indonesia's geological position - along the Pacific "Ring of Fire" - makes it prone to earthquakes and volcanoes.
Electricity and telephone networks in the area have stopped working, making it difficult to confirm the extent of the damage, the BBC's Rachel Harvey in Jakarta reports.
Ground shaking
Indonesia's worst-hit region appears to be Aceh, a strife-torn province on Sumatra's northern-most tip which has seen heavy clashes between government soldiers and separatist rebels.
Several houses in the towns of Banda Aceh and Lhokseumawe are said to have been damaged or washed away in flash floods.
A witness interviewed by a local radio station reported seeing nine bodies in Banda Aceh, where part of the town's largest hotel is said to have collapsed.
"The ground was shaking for a long time," another witness told the radio station.
The impact of the earthquake has been recorded as far afield as the Thai capital, Bangkok, and Singapore.
In November, 29 people died when an earthquake struck Indonesia's eastern province of Papua.
Nine Reportedly Killed in Indonesian Quake
50 minutes ago
World - AP Asia
JAKARTA, Indonesia - An extremely powerful earthquake rocked northern Indonesia Sunday, and radio reports said nine people were killed as some buildings collapsed and large waves flooded coastal areas.
The U.S. Geological Survey (news - web sites) said a magnitude-8.5 quake, capable of massive damage, struck at 8 a.m. about 100 miles off the west coast of Sumatra. The survey said it upgraded its initial report of 8.1 following further analysis. But Indonesian seismologists put the magnitude at 6.4 and there was no way to immediately clarify the discrepancy.
Witnesses told Jakarta's el-Shinta radio station that nine people were killed in the northernmost province of Aceh, and several shops and small buildings had collapsed. But telephone and most communication links to the region were out and there was no immediate way to confirm the casualty and damage reports.
"The ground was shaking for a long time," resident Yayan Zamzani told the station. "It must be the strongest earthquake in the last 15 years."
Residents in the provincial capital, Banda Aceh, 1,000 miles northwest of Jakarta, and others in Lhokseumawe, a city about 125 miles to the southeast, told the radio station that large waves had hit coastal regions.
An Associated Press reporter in Lhokseumawe said several houses had been damaged and that water levels on main streets in the town had reached three feet. At least one house had been swept away and residents were fleeing to higher ground, he said.
Indonesia, a country of 17,000 islands, is prone to seismic upheaval because of its location on the margins of tectonic plates that make up the so-called the "Ring of Fire" around the Pacific Ocean basin.
The quake was also felt in neighboring Thailand and Malaysia. No major damage was reported in those two countries.
The quake struck just three days after an 8.1 quake struck the ocean floor between Australia and Antarctica, causing buildings to shake hundreds of miles away but no serious damage or injury.
Quakes reaching a magnitude 8 are very rare. A quake registering magnitude 8 rocked Japan's northern island of Hokkaido on Sept. 25, 2003, injuring nearly 600 people. An 8.4 magnitude tremor that stuck off the coast of Peru on June 23, 2001, killed 74.
.
. Could you imagine if this had happened in the USA? The amount of media attention would be unbelievable.
