I have watched many news reports of the ongoing tragedy following the tsunami in the Indian Ocean, but have seen no reports of casualties in either Burma or Bangladesh. Did these two countries somehow escape the devastation even though they are in the immediate vicinity of the tsunami and its after-effects ?

Shrivats

Bangladesh did suffer casualties, but they were not as sever as those suffered by India and Sri Lanka. Myanmar faces the wrong end of the Bay of Bengal. The Tsunami was travelling from East to West, and as Burma faces the Eastern part of the Bay, it did not bear that much of the force of the tsunami. Dec 28 04, 9:10 AM

picqero

"not as severe' is a massive understatement! India, Sri Lanka, Thailand and Indonesia suffered 10's of 1,000's of fatalities, but the only report I've seen for Bangladesh is that there were two - which is about the average for a normal day! Can this be true? Also if what you say is correct about Burma not getting the brunt of the tsunami, then why should Thailand get it? Dec 28 04, 12:01 PM

Shrivats

The shock waves from the quake (and the tsunami) travel in a circle of constantly increasing radii. Hence Thailand, on the Eastern part of the circle bore a lot of the effect. wikipedia has an extensive article on the quakes. You might want to read it if you are interested. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2004_Indian_Ocean_earthquake Dec 28 04, 3:05 PM

picqero

Thanks Shrivats - excellent article and interesting image of the tsunami wavespread, though I am still at a loss to understand why there were only two casulaties in Bangladesh, and relatively few in Myanmar - though in the latter case it may, as the article says, be the reluctance of the government to report the real death toll, especially in the Irrawady delta. Dec 28 04, 3:24 PM

Flynn_17

Slightly worried about the Bangladesh case myself, as I have friends who are over there at the moment. Myanmar would never admit to having casualties. They're very secretive. Some of the worst death rates compared to the size of the place are in the Andaman and Nicobar islands... Dec 28 04, 4:31 PM

peasypod

Scary stuff. We had a little tremor here (Tasmania) last week which some seismologists have claimed that it triggered this disaster. http://www.rense.com/general61/catal.htm Dec 28 04, 9:48 PM