Accor properties affected by Tsunami
Dec 27, 2004, 1:12 pm
#1
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Accor properties affected by Tsunami
Hundreds missing from hotel
Source:AFP
28dec04
SEVERAL hundred people were missing from a single hotel on Thailand's resort island of Phuket after a devastating tsunami, the French hotel group which manages the site said today.
An Accor spokeswoman said the Sofitel Magic Lagoon Khao Lak hotel had 350 guests of various nationalities and 200 to 250 employees working when the wave struck.
About 100 had been accounted for today and evacuated to Bangkok.
Accor representatives said they could not determine the nationalities of those missing, but German television quoted German consular officials as saying that most of the tourists staying there were German nationals.
Accor had rushed about 50 employees to the site and asked for help from the Thai authorities, said the spokeswoman.
The wave "swept away" everything inside the hotel, a source said.
Accor manages two other hotels on Phuket, the Novotel Phuket and Panwa Beach Resort, where there were no reported victims.
Source:AFP
28dec04
SEVERAL hundred people were missing from a single hotel on Thailand's resort island of Phuket after a devastating tsunami, the French hotel group which manages the site said today.
An Accor spokeswoman said the Sofitel Magic Lagoon Khao Lak hotel had 350 guests of various nationalities and 200 to 250 employees working when the wave struck.
About 100 had been accounted for today and evacuated to Bangkok.
Accor representatives said they could not determine the nationalities of those missing, but German television quoted German consular officials as saying that most of the tourists staying there were German nationals.
Accor had rushed about 50 employees to the site and asked for help from the Thai authorities, said the spokeswoman.
The wave "swept away" everything inside the hotel, a source said.
Accor manages two other hotels on Phuket, the Novotel Phuket and Panwa Beach Resort, where there were no reported victims.
Dec 28, 2004, 9:40 am
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Sofitel Magic Lagoon resort, Khao Lak
From: http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stori...124531/1/.html
Time is GMT + 8 hours
Posted: 28 December 2004 2136 hrs (+8hrs GMT)
Scenes of horror at French-run hotel in Thailand
KHAO LAK, Thailand : The lush vegetation is shredded, the power lines broken like matchsticks and the swimming pool is filled with thick brown mud which cannot hide the bobbing and bloated bodies.
Two days after Asia's tidal wave horror, 280 mainly European guests at the Sofitel Magic Lagoon resort in the Thai resort of Khao Lak remain missing with relatives fearing the worst.
The luxury establishment on the southwest coast run by French group Accor was built right on the edge of the beach with its three-storey accomodation blocks divided by vast swimming pools.
When the giant tsunamis ploughed into the buildings two days ago, powering 200 metres (650 feet) inland, the wall of water consumed the buildings nearest the beach. All that remains are shattered concrete walls and piles of rubble.
Waves rushed through the U-shaped resort, tearing apart tourist bungalows. Those rooms still standing were choked with mud, sand and debris or had their tiled roofs ripped off.
Sand coated ornamental pools and bridges in the grounds. Bodies were floating in swimming pools, with soldiers using poles to retrieve them.
Soldiers in orange rubber gloves and white facemasks searched every building for the dead before loading them on trucks.
Two soldiers improvised a stretcher from a pole and a bloodstained sheet to carry the body of a bikini-clad woman. Bed linen was used to wrap the corpses.
By the middle of Tuesday afternoon, around 30 bodies bloated with water were lying wrapped in sheets at the entrance to the hotel waiting for a lorry to come and pick them up.
Throughout the hotel hung the wrenching smell of corpses and death, indicating the cleaning up process was far from over.
Scattered throughout the grounds were the banal signs of a beach holiday brutally cut short -- a pair of trainers, a boxing glove and an open suitcase spilling its contents.
The water roared into the hotel at speed and left just as quickly, smashing through windows, collapsing ceilings and plundering cars. There were no doubt many guests who never made it out of their rooms.
Stunned hotel officials in Thailand have declined to speak to the press, but Accor said in Paris that only 135 of the 415 guests staying at the hotel had been accounted for. It said 35 bodies had been found.
"We still hold out hope for around 70 people. For the rest, unfortunately we have very little hope," the head of Accor, Jean-Marc Espalioux, told French radio station Europe 1.
Throughout the complex Thai soldiers and Sofitel staff, wearing masks and gloves, searched for bodies in nooks and crannies. Many appeared on the verge of tears.
Back on the beach stray dogs wandered through the debris as the blue sea, which had enticed so many Europeans to Thailand for Christmas, was dead calm.
- AFP
Time is GMT + 8 hours
Posted: 28 December 2004 2136 hrs (+8hrs GMT)
Scenes of horror at French-run hotel in Thailand
KHAO LAK, Thailand : The lush vegetation is shredded, the power lines broken like matchsticks and the swimming pool is filled with thick brown mud which cannot hide the bobbing and bloated bodies.
Two days after Asia's tidal wave horror, 280 mainly European guests at the Sofitel Magic Lagoon resort in the Thai resort of Khao Lak remain missing with relatives fearing the worst.
The luxury establishment on the southwest coast run by French group Accor was built right on the edge of the beach with its three-storey accomodation blocks divided by vast swimming pools.
When the giant tsunamis ploughed into the buildings two days ago, powering 200 metres (650 feet) inland, the wall of water consumed the buildings nearest the beach. All that remains are shattered concrete walls and piles of rubble.
Waves rushed through the U-shaped resort, tearing apart tourist bungalows. Those rooms still standing were choked with mud, sand and debris or had their tiled roofs ripped off.
Sand coated ornamental pools and bridges in the grounds. Bodies were floating in swimming pools, with soldiers using poles to retrieve them.
Soldiers in orange rubber gloves and white facemasks searched every building for the dead before loading them on trucks.
Two soldiers improvised a stretcher from a pole and a bloodstained sheet to carry the body of a bikini-clad woman. Bed linen was used to wrap the corpses.
By the middle of Tuesday afternoon, around 30 bodies bloated with water were lying wrapped in sheets at the entrance to the hotel waiting for a lorry to come and pick them up.
Throughout the hotel hung the wrenching smell of corpses and death, indicating the cleaning up process was far from over.
Scattered throughout the grounds were the banal signs of a beach holiday brutally cut short -- a pair of trainers, a boxing glove and an open suitcase spilling its contents.
The water roared into the hotel at speed and left just as quickly, smashing through windows, collapsing ceilings and plundering cars. There were no doubt many guests who never made it out of their rooms.
Stunned hotel officials in Thailand have declined to speak to the press, but Accor said in Paris that only 135 of the 415 guests staying at the hotel had been accounted for. It said 35 bodies had been found.
"We still hold out hope for around 70 people. For the rest, unfortunately we have very little hope," the head of Accor, Jean-Marc Espalioux, told French radio station Europe 1.
Throughout the complex Thai soldiers and Sofitel staff, wearing masks and gloves, searched for bodies in nooks and crannies. Many appeared on the verge of tears.
Back on the beach stray dogs wandered through the debris as the blue sea, which had enticed so many Europeans to Thailand for Christmas, was dead calm.
- AFP