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SetSail: Hi Al and Beth: We're so relieved to hear you are OK. The boat was not a worry - we figured you would be deep enough. It was just whether or not you were ashore.
A&B: A whole lot of the water around here is not really deep. You get used to driving around with only about 6 feet under your keel. Sort of like Bahamas, but not clear. Our normal anchoring spot has only about 4 feet under the keel at low tide. That's where we were, but it was high tide. When we moved to "deeper" water it was 30 to 40 ft deep.
Our friends (as well as ourselves) usually anchor in Nai Harn Bay on the west coast of Phuket in this season. There the depths are 20 to 40 feet for the usual places. ALL of the boats in Nai Harn were OK. They went up and down, and the currents had them dancing too close to others when they were trying to up anchor and get REALLY out to deep waters. But most came back in and took up their spots once the wave situation seemed stabilized. Heard no reports of any dragging of anchors due to the ground tackle used.
SetSail: Have you heard anything about the Maldives, Andamans, or other Indian Ocean atolls? I assume they must have been inundated - but hopefully the boats at anchor were OK.
A&B: By now you must know the Andamans have huge loss of life and property. Even whole small islands are said to have gone! I can't imagine what some of the lovely coral reefs now look like.
Likewise the Maldives - not a great loss of life, but plenty of property damage and infrastructure gone. No reports that any yachts were damaged there, but then there are probably only one or two there now, too early for the fleet to be arriving. Seychelles took a hit and we heard reports that the yacht club there and moorings were torn up.
There were 3 boats in Chagos (Salomon Atoll) and they said the water went up but caused them no problems. Some of the "camps" were water washed, but those things are piece meal and pick up anyway. All built from driftwood and flotsam, so back it goes to sea and new stuff will arrive.
SetSail: When you get around to writing about this we are really curious about how anchorage bottom shape, depth of water, ground tackle size, etc. play into who did OK and who did not. Also, if one is safe in an atoll-like anchorage, as long as you are afloat.
A&B: The marinas that were so heavily damaged here in Langkawi were both totally enclosed basins - and the entrances both face SW. when the water rushed in it couldn't get out, so just whirl pooled around, smashing boats and floats and the pilings in the turbulence. Also, it wasn't just one wave apparently, but a series - most say 3 dominant surges. So when the water from the first wave hit it ran ashore and then receded into the face of the next onrushing wall and compounded the forces and quantities of water. Some of the boats in the marinas went in and out the channel a couple of times because of this! I am sending Elyse a CD disk of photos - amazing! (Images to be posted as soon as they arrive.)
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