WTVM.com and WTVM News Leader 9, Columbus, GA | Thai Families Pray for Loved Ones in Southeast Asia

Thai Families Pray for Loved Ones in Southeast Asia

Swallowing walls of water have receded along Thailand coasts, leaving behind some 2-thousand bodies. Rescue workers many of them volunteers search for the dead. Covering their faces with masks as the smell of devastation lingers. "People are afraid, panicked, what is going to happen now, " says Tanistha Dyer, a Columbus restaurant owner, who grew up in Thailand.

Most of Dyer's family is still there but she has spoken to her sister by phone and everyone is ok. She says, "after it happened nobody went out to help because they are afraid, it would happen again so they waited until everything was gone."

Almost everything is gone South of Bangkok on the treasured island of Phuket, a popular tourist getaway. As people try to identify bodies on land and in water there, Pranee Brown has received word her friend's husband survived. She says, "When he saw people running he asked them what happened they told him they were running from the earthquake and water was coming in so he ran with everybody else.

For those who have survived the heartache will likely continue, hundreds of homes along the beaches have been flattened.

Dyer says those who have survived may never be able to rebuild. She's worked in insurance and says about 80-percnet of people in Thailand do not carry insurance. Both women say they are saddened by this tragedy and plan to help. Dyer told News Leader Nine she is planning on donating around 10 coffins. She says its an honorable thing to do when someone dies as she says there are not enough coffins in Thailand to bury the dead, especially now.