Best on the Box choice for December 27th…
This ITV documentary examines, twenty years on, the 2004 Indian Ocean Boxing Day tsunami.
At 7:58am local time, a major earthquake with a magnitude of 92–9.3 Mw struck the west coast of Aceh in Sumatra, Indonesia. The undersea earthquake, known in the scientific community as the Sumatra–Andaman earthquake, was caused by a rupture along the fault between the Burma and the Indian Plate, and reached a Mercalli intensity of IX some areas.
A massive tsunami with waves up to 30 m (100 ft) high, devastated communities along the surrounding coasts of the Indian Ocean. It was the most powerful earthquake ever recorded in Asia and the most powerful earthquake of the 21st century. The hypocentre of the main earthquake was located approximately160 km (100 mi) off the western coast of northern Sumatra, in the Indian Ocean, just north of Simeulue Island at a depth of 30 km19 mi) below mean sea level.
The abrupt vertical displacement of the seabed by meters during the earthquake caused the displacement of massive volumes water, resulting in a tsunami.
The natural disaster killed around 230,000 people and displaced 1.4 million more, it was one of the deadliest events caused by nature in world history. Narrated through the first-hand experiences of individuals from around the globe, cameras capture the catastrophic events that transpired on the morning of December 26th, 2004.
Among them is Rob Forkan, from England, who recounts the harrowing ordeal of his desperate attempts to rescue his family at a paradise beach in Sri Lanka.
Tsunami: The Wave That Shook the World, ITV1 and STV, tonight at 10 pm
