Map from USGS, altered

As you may have heard, the fifth largest quake in a century and the largest quake period in forty years hit in one of the worst possible places–underwater in the Indian Ocean, causing a large tsunami with walls up to 30 feet tall impacting shores of Indonesia and of nearby nations, hitting nearby Sri Lanka next worst after Indonesia itself. As of this writing, the death toll is up to 8,600, but that number will certainly grow, and probably will exceed 10,000. (Note: as I wrote this, new stories came out stating the 10,000 mark had already been exceeded). Go here for the time-ranked Google search results on the quake (link should work through most of January, 2005).

The quake hit early morning, and I’m guessing that the areas worst afflicted did not have sufficient tsunami warning services–in Japan, when any quake hits, there is an immediate notification on television about possible tsunamis, and local public warning alarms as well. Indonesia was just hit too fast for warnings to have much of an effect, and India and Sri Lanka were not part of an international warning system.

I include the map at top right because few news pages are showing where the quake hit in the region. The map originally comes from the USGS, from a page on the quake today. If you’re interested, here is a page showing the 11 largest quakes over the past century.

The death toll so far:

Indonesia: 4185
Sri Lanka: 3225
India: 2447
Thailand: 310
Malaysia: 42
Maldives: 15
Bangladesh: 2
Total: 10,226

Update: here’s a better map, just found via Yahoo Photos.