uncle arnie wrote:

Fellow working in a dive school said the bay at Phuket, Thailant emptied
completely and fish were flopping around for 5 minutes before the wave hit.
He realized what was happening and got a bunch of people to the second
story of the building, which saved most of them, although they did get
washed out of the building. This was on As It Happens, CBC/RCI.

I wonder how many of the uneducated fishermen around the ocean wandered
onto the bare beaches out of curiosity, not knowing anything about
tsunamis, and got trapped. That's what happened when a tsunami hit
Hawaii in 1946-people got curious as to why the ocean level had suddenly
gone down and ventured onto the newly revealed land, only to be drowned
when the return wave hit. Then again, all the video footage I've seen on
American TV shows the ocean gently lapping on the beach, then suddenly a
huge wave comes out of nowhere and washes over everything. One tape
shows the wave towering higher than a one story building on the
beach-you can see the spray on the roof before it's totally engulfed.
ABC (US) interviewed an Australian woman who was holding on to her two
young sons when the wave pulled them under, and the only way to save
herself was to let go of one of the boys. So she let the oldest (five
years old) go, and watched as he was washed away. Somehow, he survived,
even though he can't swim-he grabbed on to a door floating in the water
and rode it to safety.