Nela Village reported as wrecked

Reports on the Tsunami in Temotu Province (Solomon Islands) in the Solomon Star newspaper say "95 per cent of homes in Nela village were washed away."

solomonstarnews.com/news/national/17108-help-on-the-way

Unfortunately this house with all these happy kids in 2012, is very close to the beach and would have been the first to go:

Our thoughts go to the kids, their parents and the rest of the village at this difficult time.

Sipuru Rove of the National Disaster Management Office (NDMO) told the Solomon Star "an estimated 3,000 people were homeless"

Red Cross disaster manager Cameron Vudi said

"There are still reports coming in. Most of the reports are confined to areas that are accessible by road but there are a lot more communities that have been damaged."

Nela is close to Lata, almost a suburb and easily accessible by road.

#Map: Solomon Islands: Damaged houses and casualties as at 6 Feb 2013 -buzz.mw/-DtH_y

— UNOCHA (@UNOCHA) February 8, 2013

Relief web reliefweb.int/country/slb
Relief web have an assessment that looks like the places affected were all on the west coast of the island.

Message from Ben Hepworth on Pidgeon Island (9 Feb13 8:30 AEDST)

"..thought I would let you know that Reef Islands and Carlyle Bay are fine despite the tsunami."

In another article in the Solomon Star:
Temotu Provincial Disaster Management Office spokesman Frank Menoya said search for missing people in affected areas are still continuing. solomonstarnews.com/news/national/17109-1million-for-relief-supplies

I expect that the Solomon Star will be the best source for future stories as the big international news organisations move on.

Radio NZ comes a close second:
rnzi.com/pages/news.php?op=read&id=73892
The premier of Temotu province says 3,100 people are now without shelter as they brave continuing shakes after Friday morning’s shallow aftershock.
Father Charles Brown Beu says people fled again to higher ground after the 6.7 quake, the largest following Wednesday’s 8.0 earthquakes and subsequent tsunami.

New Zealand’s Foreign Minister, Murray McCully, says the remoteness of the area means it may take some time to gain a full picture of the extent of the damage.

Tsunami Lata Wharf 3feet

Tsunami LATA WHARF 3feet 18min after earthquake.

All this shows how powerful a metre (or a half) of tsunami wave can be.
ptwc.weather.gov/ptwc/?region=1&id=pacific.TSUPAC.2013.02.06.0347

News reports say 5 are dead and a hundred houses destroyed.
Radio NZ reports that a surge wave affected three or four villages. Luke Taula, a fisheries officer in Lata, told the ABC the tsunami arrived in small tidal surges rather than as one large wave.
"We have small waves come in, then go out again, then come back in. The waves reached the airport terminal," he said. He said the worst damage would be to villages on the western side of a point that protects the main township.
radionz.co.nz/news/world/127416/

The coast affected includes the airport in this picture:
The village of Nela, see William Membuta, our thoughts go to you, your family and village at this time.

Watching on YouTube
No mention in any news reports that the local hospital in Lata already has too few doctors.
Few mentions of damage to Lata airport or the extent of that damage. The coast to the west of the airport would also have houses damaged if the airport had problems. The main town of Lata is up a hill, the harbour is on the other side from the brunt of the tsunami and recorded .9M rise.

youtube.com/results?search_query=tsunami+solomon+islands&oq=tsunami

Note: this YouTube video is a fake:
youtu.be/_oBr7fOT_pk
Definite tsumani wave but I am calling it a fake. Way too much infrastructure for Lata on Ndendo in Temotu province, Solomon Islands. No reports of it hitting anywhere with a coastline like this.

Nela session

Friday
Up at 6am and video the walk from my room to the swimming hole/pool. See video: youtu.be/lM0qC--rKGo
Car comes at 8am and drives me to Nela.

The surface is smooth. I start with the right hander and quickly find it is a bit tame.I move to wide on the left and work out how to not hurt myself on this challenging back hand ride. Catch a couple and have some clearance sets come through that make me realise how easy it was at Nave to get away from the clean-up sets.
Come in and then go out again with the Nikon Coolpix to try to film some of this surf. Photos from the shore are too far away. The wind had picked up a lot and spoilt the surface and the waves a lot.

On the way back in I catch one of the inside "canoe run" waves and hear a big cheer from the crowd assembled on the beach.
Afternoon at the Internet Cafe at Lata, on the only PC there, I get a virus the minute I plug in the USB drive. Take rest of the afternoon off.

Three days of pain

Tuesday, Wednesday & Thursday
Tuesday's flight is postponed until Wednesday. I freak out, I don't have any more or enough $SI. The Lata South Pacific Bank (SPB) branch does not have EFTPOS, all savings and cheque accounts. ANZ have an ATM but they have turned it off! Finally, after lots of asking if people take credit cards (and give them back) I find someone to help me out.
Meanwhile the Solomon Airways agent keeps advising postponed flights, once for bad weather. It makes it hard to do anything when you have to keep in contact with the office in case a flight arrives.

On Wednesday, after noticing the map at the Luelta Conference centre I walk to a likely looking surfing spot called Nela. There I meet William Membuta.

Finally the airline says that the next flight it Saturday that means I can go surfing tomorrow, Friday. I arrange a car to take my board to Nela in the morning.

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Next: 2012/03/nela-session