A man who survived the devastating Boxing Day tsunami has revealed the haunting words he heard moments before disaster struck.
The Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami remains one of the most devastating natural disasters in modern history, with over 227,000 people losing their lives on 26 December 2004.
Two decades on from the disaster and several survivors are marking the anniversary by sharing their harrowing recollections from the day.
First waves of 2004 Boxing Day tsunami
Credit: YouTube/JulianHadden1
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One of those survivors was Luke Simon, now 50, who was at a cafe on Thailand’s Koh Phi Phi islands with his brother Piers, girlfriend Sophie Moghadam as well as friends Ben Seyfried and Nick Thorne on the morning of 26 December.
Luke had been working in Thailand as a PE teacher and had been visited by his brother for Christmas.
However they would instead find themselves caught up in an unthinkable tragedy.
Recalling the events in an interview with The Mirror alongside his appearance in ITV documentary Tsunami: The Wave That Shook The World, Luke revealed the chilling lengths he went to in order to survive the 100ft wave.
“The horizon was sort of bubbling up and down because the wave had already hit the shore and then had destroyed anything in its path, and then was coming straight at us,” he explained.
A photograph of the wave taken in Hat Rai Lay Beach, Krabi, Thailand (AFP via Getty Images)
Unsure of the impending danger and observing people frantically running inland, Luke initially believed there could’ve been a gunman or a rabid dog on the loose. However he would soon realise the gravity of the situation they were in after hearing two chilling words. “Water, coming.”
What came next was a desperate dash for survival as Luke, Piers, Sophie, Ben and Nick attempted to get themselves to higher ground.
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WOMAN WHO LOST FIANCÉ AND TWO CHILDREN IN BOXING DAY TSUNAMI MAKES DEVASTATING DISCOVERY 20 YEARS ON
Luke was able to hoist himself onto a nearby roof and set about helping Sophie up. Ben and Nick had been swept into a nearby alleyway by the water, while Piers suddenly vanished from his sight.
After watching the wave destroy everything in its path, the group began to search for missing Piers.
“We were all together again but Piers isn’t, there is something not right here. I tried to stop myself putting together these sentences, but I couldn’t,” Luke said, adding that he had mentally begun to explore multiple scenarios of what could’ve happened to his brother.
Luke searching for his brother Piers in the aftermath of the disaster (ROSLAN RAHMAN/AFP via Getty Images)
Five days and later and Luke would finally discover that his brother had been killed in the destruction after travelling through makeshift morgues where deceased bodies were being held.
In the two decades since the disaster Luke has focused on charity work, setting up School in a Bag – a charity which supplies school essentials to those in need worldwide – and commemorating his brother’s passing every Boxing Day.Featured Image Credit: ITV/ROSLAN RAHMAN/AFP via Getty Images
Topics: World News, ITV, TV
Brenna Cooper
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Updated 20:46 27 Aug 2024 GMT+1Published 20:45 27 Aug 2024 GMT+1
Footage from tourist shows chaotic aftermath of Boxing Day tsunami
The footage shows the devastation caused by the 2004 Boxing Day tsunami, which killed 149 British tourists
Rare footage from a tourist shows the devastating aftermath of the 2004 Boxing Day tsunami disaster.
It was around 228,000 people that died as a result of the 9.1 magnitude earthquake and giant tsunami that bulldozed into Indonesian coastlines on 26 December 2004.
It was one of the largest natural disasters ever recorded, and had devastating consequences for several countries.
Over two decades on from the disaster, many of the towns and villages have been rebuilt or totally transformed.
The 2004 tsunami was one of the largest that has ever been recorded. (YouTube/@kallewidelius9395)
The estimated total cost of the damage from around Indonesia was $10 billion (£6.4 billion).
It was thought that 141,000 houses were destroyed, which accounted for 47 percent of the entire damage.
Footage from a tourist who managed to survive the enormous waves reveals the devastating impact of the natural disaster.
One of the most badly affected parts was an island off Thailand called Koh Phi Phi, which is where the video was taken.
The small island was completely vulnerable, and was attacked by the giant waves from every angle.
The video shows water pouring into hotels, with people running up the stairs to the highest point for protection.Play
The tourists were able to film the devastation from a window on a high floor, and everything below appeared to be totally submerged.
Houses were flooded, buildings collapsed, as the waves reached a hight of 65-100ft in some places.
For many, they had no chance of escaping to safety.
Joe Giardina was on holiday at the time of the disaster, with his wife, Ivana, and son, Paul, in Phuket.
Speaking to ABC News, he said: “I said, ‘My God, look at that. That’s an extraordinary wave. It’s come up onto the footpath’, but it kept coming.
“I didn’t anticipate this thing to develop into a wall of water.
The hotel was flooded. (YouTube/@kallewidelius9395)
“You’re just an animal.
“You’re a creature at that moment paralysed by your fear.
“Everything just happened in the millisecond.”
An estimated 10,000 British tourists were affected by the tsunami, and 149 died.
A large majority were thought to be staying in beach resorts in Thailand and Sri Lanka.
Among the Brits who died was Sir Richard Attenborough’s 49-year-old daughter Jane Attenborough, and her 14-year-old daughter, who were holidaying in a resort when disaster struck.
In the twenty years after the devastating tsunami and earthquake, it’s been reported there are almost 400 victims that remain unidentified and unclaimed.Featured Image Credit: YouTube/@kallewidelius9395)
Topics: World News, Environment, Travel
Mia Williams
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Published 16:43 13 Dec 2024 GMT
Palliative care doctor shares the most common phrases people say moments before they die
Dr Simran Malhotra revealed what her patients are usually thinking in their final hours
Doctors might have a reputation for saving lives and tending to the sick, but they play an equally important role in helping their patients through death too.
Some clinicians also specialise in palliative care, meaning they are equipped to care for people with serious illnesses and those who sadly won’t ever recover.
Whether it’s relieving patients from pain, managing their symptoms or simply lending a sympathetic ear, these heroes do it all – including Dr Simran Malhotra.
She has been in the world of medicine for more than a decade and has cared for thousands of patients in their final hours over the years.
End of life doctor on dying
Credit: BBC Ideas
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She’s a triple board certified physician in internal medicine, a hospice and palliative care doctor, and a lifestyle medicine coach, so she really has got most bases covered.
The medic, from the US, explained that she’s learned a lot from her patients throughout her career – including what their biggest regrets are when they are lay on their death bed.
Inevitably, this has influenced the way she navigates her own life, and Dr Malhotra hopes that she can encourage others to take heed of the words of wisdom she has heard along the way too.
Explaining how she ended up in palliative care, she told Health Digest: “I remember one of my very first rotations during my internal medicine residency was in the ICU.
“I just felt so much for the patients and their families because I felt like they didn’t get enough time and attention from the medical team.
“And so for me, when I did my first palliative care rotation, I got to sit down with a family, I got to understand what their goals were, what their hopes were, what their worries were, and it really allowed me to get in with them in their experience and try to provide the most personalised and compassionate care possible.”
Dr Simran Malhotra revealed the most common things which patients say before passing away (Instagram/@drsimran.malhotra)
With this kind of attitude, it’s no wonder that patients feel comfortable sharing their final thoughts with her.
She explained that the majority of people tend to discuss whether they feel as though they have fulfilled everything they wanted to in life.
Dr Malhotra said: “I found that my elderly patients will often share things like, ‘I’m at peace’ or ‘I’ve lived a good life’.
“Whereas, for my younger patients, I haven’t really had any patients that have shared openly any specific words. It really comes down to like, ‘I’m not ready to die, I have so much more living to do’.”
However, she doesn’t think that age is the reason for this difference.
“I think it has less to do with age and more to do with a sense of unfinished business,” Dr Malhotra continued.
The palliative care specialist says her patients have influenced how she lives her own life (Instagram/@drsimran.malhotra)
She explained: “The elderly have had more time to live their lives…the young, on the other hand, are still in the midst of living.
“They still have so much potential and so many dreams yet to be realised. And that is why it is more difficult for them to come to terms with their own mortality and share words of acceptance.”
If you’re someone who’d struggle for a conversation starter in these kind of circumstances, she has some words of advice regarding what you could say.
Dr Malhotra urged people to get out the ‘simple things which matter most’ in a patient’s final hours, such as telling them you love them, thanking them or perhaps asking for forgiveness.
She added: “When the time does start to come near, I encourage all my patients and their families to share the things that matter most to them.
“[These words] can mean the world to someone in their final moments, and I’ve seen firsthand how much of a difference it makes.”Featured Image Credit: YouTube/@GrungeHQ/Getty Stock Images
Topics: Health, Lifestyle, News
Olivia Burke
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Updated 08:37 29 Apr 2024 GMT+1Published 08:30 29 Apr 2024 GMT+1
George Gilbey’s mum shares heartbreaking last words of Gogglebox star before tragic death
Gilbey called his mother just hours before his death and left a heartfelt final message
George Gilbey’s mother has revealed the final words that he’d said to her before his tragic death.
The Gogglebox fan-favourite was often joined on the show throughout his eight season stint by his mother, Linda McGarry, and step-dad, Pete McGarry.
The father-of-one, 40, died from sustained injuries after falling through plastic skylight, as Coroner’s officer Deborah Frost cited a ‘traumatic injury to head and torso consistent with fall from height’.
Gilbey was known for his role on the Channel 4 show alongside his mother and step-dad. (Channel 4)
Linda, from Essex, spoke for the first time since her son’s passing, and said it was an ‘honour’ to have him as her son, adding that the two ‘had a blast for 40 years’.
She revealed to The Sun that he always fussed over her as she had been diagnosed with Parkinson’s Disease, but also that he himself was struggling with his own problems, including financially.
Gilbey was staying with a relative the night prior to his death, but called her on the morning of the tragic incident.
She said: “He phoned me at 9.30 on the morning and said he was working, and asked me for his ‘breakfast money’.
“I put £30 in his account so he could get food, and he seemed fine.
His mum revealed the last words he’d said to her. (Instagram/GeorgeGilbey)
“He had a drink the night before, and liked a bottle of white wine or two, but was happy that he was working. He ended the phone call by saying, ‘I love you’ like he usually did.
“I treasure those words,” she concluded.
Gilbey was on a carer’s allowance of £190 per month following his mother’s diagnosis with Parkinson’s, but Linda revealed that he was working this particular job to save money and move closer to his daughter Amelie, who lives with her mother in South West London.
At the time of his death, Gilbey was fixing a roof at a warehouse in Shoebury, Essex, before he plummeted to his death on March 27.
An inquest around the events were opened then suspended, as a man in his forties was arrested on suspicion of gross negligence manslaughter, but was released under investigation.
The Gogglebox star tragically passed away. (Karwai Tang/WireImage)
Gilbey’s mother revealed what it was like on the day of his death, saying: “When I got that call, it was horrendous.
“It did not feel real and we raced to the site, thinking that he was still alive. They stopped us going in and sent us to a hospital.
“The police met us at Southend Hospital, and told us he hadn’t made it. I kept thinking it was not real, and still feel like it is not,” she said.
She also thinks that the main cause of his death was the lack of safety netting below.
“He was up there fixing the roof. Apparently he stepped on a weak bit of roof and there was no netting. I don’t think it was safe.” Linda said.
“I think it was instant, and hope it was so he didn’t suffer.”
Gilbey may be best known for his time on Gogglebox, but he also reached the Celebrity Big Brother final in 2014.Featured Image Credit: Instagram/GeorgeGilbey / Karwai Tang/WireImage/Getty Images
Topics: Gogglebox, Celebrity News, TV, UK News
Joshua Nair
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Updated 19:40 19 Dec 2024 GMTPublished 19:36 19 Dec 2024 GMT
Chilling final words of pilot who let his children fly plane before it crashed and killed everyone onboard
The chilling incident took place on a flight heading from Russia to Hong Kong
Here are the haunting final words of a pilot who made the fatal decision to allow his children to sit in the cockpit and pretend to fly the plane.
On 23 March, 1994 one of the most tragic, and arguably avoidable, crashes happened which caused the deaths of all 75 people onboard.
Aeroflot Flight 593 was heading from Moscow to Hong Kong on a late night flight. Onboard was captain Andrew Viktorovich Danilov, an experienced pilot who’d clocked around 9,500 hours of flight experience alongside first officer Igor Vasilyevich Piskaryov and relief captain Yaroslav Vladimirovich Kudrinsky.
While the three pilots were more than experienced to handle the controls of a commercial jet, none of the men could account for human error caused by children sitting at the plane’s controls.
The tragedy occurred on an Aeroflot flight (JoanValls/Urbanandsport /NurPhoto via Getty Images)
The flight was first international trip for Kudrinsky’s kids Yana, 13, and Eldar, 15, with the pilot wanting to mark the children’s first trip by allowing them into the cockpit to see where their father worked.
Despite being against regulations, the crew onboard believed it would be safe as the plane was on autopilot, which meant the children wouldn’t actually be in control of aircraft.
First into her father’s seat was Yana, who sat down in-front of the controls as around 00:43am and pretended to ‘fly’ the plane while it was on autopilot.
Kudrinsky’s son was next into the chair and was allowed to move the controls and pretend to fly the plane at around 00:51am.
Disaster would strike just under four minutes later.
At 00:54am, the teenager manipulated the control stick for over 30 seconds with inputs up to 10 kilograms, which contradicted the input made by the autopilot to keep the aircraft stable and straight, which then changed the flight control settings to manual.
Aeroflot Flight 593 black box tape
Credit: TikTok/@onlythemostviral
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A slight indicator light flashed up to inform the crew that Eldar was now in partial control of the plane, however the crew weren’t used to non-soviet aircraft and failed to notice the warning.
The aircraft then entered a bank, with the autopilot unable to maintain altitude due to the angle of the wings.
Captain Kudrinsky then ordered the co-pilot to take control as he got his son away from his seat so he could take command of the aircraft.
“Eldar, get away. Go to the back, go to the back Eldar! You see the danger don’t you,” Kudrinsky could be heard saying on cockpit voice recording.
“Go away, go away Eldar! Go away, go away. I tell you to go away!”
The pilots then attempted to regain control of the aircraft and were nearly successful in doing so, however they accidentally over corrected and sent the plane into an almost vertical climb, stalling and sending it into a spin.
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The pilots attempted to regain control, but were ultimately unable to do so (YouTube/MorfoAtari)
It began to lose altitude, and eventually descended beneath the minimum safe altitude for the flight at the section of its route over mountainous terrain.
At 00:59, air traffic control in nearby Novokuznetsk were waiting for a position update through radio transmission from the flight, but it never came, as the flight stopped appearing on their radar screens.
It turns out that at 00:58, just two minutes and six seconds after the events unfolded, Flight 593 crashed in a flat altitude at high vertical speed, estimated to be around 160mph, in the Kuznetsk Alatau Mountain range in the Kemerovo Oblast region of southern Russia.
The aircraft was destroyed, killing everyone onboard.
Aeroflot initially attempted to deny the pilots were at fault, however the above transcript would ultimately be published, confirming the crash was human error.