The Impact of the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami on Sri Lanka - ArcGIS StoryMaps

WHAT HAPPENED?On the morning after Christmas in 2004 at 7am (IST) (Wikipedia, n.d.), an earthquake of magnitude 9.1 (on the Richter scale) struck off the west coast of Sumatra, Indonesia. The epicentre was 30km under the seabed and approximately 250 kilometres south to south-west of Banda Aceh (Australian Institute for Disaster Resilience, n.d.). Within 2 hours (Australian Institute for Disaster Resilience, n.d.) of the earthquake striking, a tsunami with waves as high as 41ft (Wikipedia, n.d.) hit Sri Lanka's west coast. Around 35,000 people were killed, while over 21,000 were injured, 516,000 were displaced and over 88,000 homes were destroyed. In addition to this, 166 schools, 4 universities and 18 vocational training centers as well as 97 healthcare facilities were badly affected (Sunil, 2005). Moreover, Direct losses were estimated to be approximately US$1 billion and total reconstruction costs about US$2 billion – 7 per cent of Sri Lanka's annual Gross Domestic Product (Australian Government, 2014).