Life In Post-Tsunami Thailand:On Takua Pa’s Highway 4

Jimmy Crouch, former chief dispatcher of Newtown’s 911 emergency center, has been living and working in Thailand. Certified as an emergency medical technician (EMT) and emergency number professional (ENP) he filed this second report in the aftermath of the tsunami.

 

By Jimmy Crouch

A French rescue worker and I are talking. We are driving along Highway 4. The highway hummed with different types of relief agency vehicles.

I am amazed how different things look on this highway. Weeks ago, the highway was not simply busy with traffic, it was jammed. Jam-packed with search, rescue, and emergency relief operations. Now we have moved into a post-tsunami long-term reconstruction phase. There are no more traffic jams.

The situation goes back to December 26, the day the tsunami came to this area with amazing force. The waves reached as high as 35 feet and moved in as fast as 26 feet per second, destroying everything in their path. Resorts were crumpled and debris scattered everywhere. The waves traveled as far as a mile inland, sweeping across Highway 4.

 Vehicles that were not able to outrun the advancing waves were picked up and tumbled about like children’s toys. A wall clock was found on the beach with its hands stopped at 10:26 am.

Several thousand Westerners and Asians were killed, thousands more injured, and thousands made homeless. But just as many thousands responded to help the victims of the tsunami.

A Quest To Save Lives

Initially, there was a rush to save the severely injured. Around 30 minutes after the tsunami struck, surgeons Dr Kannikar Laohavichit and Dr Kajohusak Kawjarus were asked to go to Takua Pa Hospital. They were told that there was some sort of wave-related incident in Khao Lak and the victims were on their way to the hospital. The doctors were under the impression they were going to provide first aid to about a dozen people and then transfer them to Phang Nga Hopital for surgery.

When the surgeons arrived at the hospital they could not believe their eyes. Hundreds were at the hospital waiting for treatment. The injured arrived in all sorts of civilian transport. The surgeons operated nonstop for 24 hours until relief arrived.

Forty-eight hours after the tsunami, official search-and-rescue operations began in Takua Pa. Thai search and rescue team personnel arrived. But they had a hard job since they had no equipment. Some arrived in ambulances. Typical Thai ambulances are “load and go” with little or no prehospital care provided. There was no equipment on these ambulances, just a stretcher in the back. Rescuers dug in the rubble with bare hands and small handheld tools. Their focus was to recover bodies.

Seventy-two hours after the tsunami, elite international rescue teams started to arrive. One German team worked throughout the night digging through the rubble under high-powered floodlights. That next morning I viewed the team in their smart-looking all-terrain vehicles. They seemed to be the first team with an objective to save victims that might be still alive, trapped in the collapsed buildings. The team stated they had a 20 percent chance of finding someone still alive.

My Team

My involvement began on day four in the aftermath of the tsunami. I drove in donated supplies. In my truck was a load of clothing, food, and coffins. The coffins were in great need. On day five, I joined up with a medical team and served as an emergency medical technician (EMT).

On day five we were quite busy.

We drove to different sites among the hills of Bang Sak. The dirt road was narrow and windy. The vehicle in front of me kicked up a plume of dust. I rolled up the windows and turned on the air conditioner.

 To all appearances you would not know who we were. Our Medical Field Unit operated out of my old pickup truck.

In the bed of my pickup was the medical team. Dr Sirirote Kittisararong of Raksakon Hospital, Sakonnakorn, Northeast Thailand, headed our team.

 We arrived at a site where 70 refugees had gathered. They were living in makeshift tents. We started treating people with infected wounds and counseled those with post-traumatic stress.

Dr Kittisararong cleaned the deeply infected wound of the owner of Ban Paddawon Resort hotel. As his wounds were being treated he told a dramatic story of narrowly escaping from death. He was in the bathroom of his hotel when the Tsunami hit.

“With the first of six waves, the bathroom was flooded,” he said. “With the second wave, I was washed out to sea. It was with the sixth wave that I was washed back to the beach from which I ran away.” He kept on running. Many others also fled up in the hills, staying there, fearing another tsunami would come.

A Multitude of Agencies

Later in the morning, a Japanese rescue team arrived. Their intention was to set up a mobile unit at our site but we beat them to it. The Japanese lead doctor asked if we had any coordination meetings. I advised him, “No, everyone is freelancing.” The Japanese left our area, continuing on their search for a place go.

Such was the recovery effort. There were multitudes of organizations, personnel, and volunteers that had responded. No dispatch system requested us. There was no focused direction. No central command to coordinate resources.

On day six of the aftermath, we treated another group of refugees behind Khao Lak School. After that (with difficulty), we make our way over to the old Takua-pa tin mining village. We were in a traffic jam! The road that leads into the village was not only jammed with aid workers but, surprisingly, with sightseers as well.

When we got close to the village the road was so jammed we decided to wait it out a while. It was then that we found out that another medical team had beaten us to it. “Probably that Japanese rescue team,” I thought. We then headed over to a different village only to find out that the refugees had been moved from that site already.

Later in the day, we went to the corpse-cleaning center at Wat Yan Yao Temple. We responded after hearing that volunteers needed to be treated for stress.

Over a three-day period, our team treated a couple hundred people at several different sites. Treatment consisted of attending to patients with infected wounds and post-traumatic stress. We were in the parks, the fields, the schools, and the temples and in the hills where survivors fled.

A part of me was worried. Worried that somewhere there might be a village that was missed. It was important to give proper attention to the festering wounds that these people had in order to prevent loss of limb or life. It was also important to counsel these people in order to help prevent post-traumatic stress. My fears turned out to be well-founded.

Nearly two weeks into the aftermath of the tsunami, a medical team was sent to treat 50 families in Thai Muang. This was a village that had not been visited before. The team was headed by Dr Phecha Mitrakul of Nakhon Christian Hospital, Nakhon Si Thammarat, Southern Thailand.

The Post-Tsunami Phase

A month has passed since the tsunami struck. Yesterday, I visited Takua Pa Senanukul School.

English Resource Manager Kmajorn Mamsanguan read off figures of students that were affected by the tsunami. Of the high school’s 1,900 students, 239 were affected.

I could not help having tears in my eyes as Manager Mamsnguan reported the figures. Ten students have died and 18 are missing. Ten students have lost a father with a further six fathers missing. Seven students have lost a mother, with another 16 missing.

Today, I am on my way back into the hills of Bang Sak. I drop off the French rescue worker at Bang Muang Refugee camp. It is a huge camp of more than 4,000 refugees with 57 international and local aid agencies working there.

In the hills, I am now helping that group of 70 move back to their tsunami-destroyed village. I help them move into temporary shelters in what is now Bang Sak Refugee Camp.

The refugees walk me around proudly, showing off their new temporary quarters. There is loud laughter from the children running about, playing games. Many women are busily cooking dinner in their little coal-burning stoves. Electricians are finishing up connecting florescent lights on the sides of the shelters.

In Perspective

As the refugees move on to rebuild their lives, it is my hope that Thailand will iron out the many problems with its disaster emergency management system and communications network.

Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra does not hide the fact that the system needs to be dramatically overhauled. A well thought-out plan will give Thailand the means to intervene quickly and efficiently without leaving anything to chance.

There is an opportunity for international communications professionals to share their expertise in these matters.

Secondly, I would hope that an elite Thai search and rescue units will be raised-up. Teams ready to respond within 24 hours to conduct rescue operations with high-tech gear.

Finally, I hope for the further development of the emergency medical system. As mentioned in this article, the typical emergency crew responds with no equipment. Little or no prehospital care is provided and there are few emergency medical technicians (EMTs) in this country.