Waka Over The Kingdom Of Tonga
Monday
31.12.01
Tropical
cyclone Waka hits Tonga the very first hours of the new year
2002.
 We
were in Tongatapu that night, took pictures and wrote about
our impressions and about hurricane Waka in our german
diary.
Waka mainly hit
 the
islands of Vava’u, which are about a 50- minutes- flight away from Tongatapu,
where we are at the moment. It seems that 70- 90% of the houses in Vava’u
are destroyed or badly damaged. Communication and power supply broke down
and are not re-established everywhere.
The following links seem to be a good starting point for more information about
cyclone Waka (most of them dead and deleted by now):
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/storydisplay.cfm?storyID=584778&thesection=news&thesubsection=world
http://www.reliefweb.int/w/rwb.nsf/UNID/4EB5205E193CD15EC1256B3300510964?OpenDocument
Photos
of the dammage cyclone Waka did on Vava’u:
Silvester mit Waka auf Tonga
Tuesday,
22.01.02
Meantime
we interviewed a couple of people having been on Vava’u that
new year’s night of hurricane Waka and wrote about their experiences
in our German
diary.
The most impressive might be the
 one
of a young couple finding shelter in their rainwater tank
after Waka had destroyed their home.
Today we also received the first e-mail coming from Vava’u after the storm.
We publish it here to give you an idea of the present situation at Vava’u:
”Just
to give you all an update, most of the operators are more
or less back in operation it took at least 4 days to get back
into action with Beluga, Sunsail Yacht Charters and The Moorings
Yacht Charters to rig together some sort of dock so we could
place our boats somewhere.
The community is great the support that everyone gave to each was excellent,
the first 5 days after Waka was the hardest days with the big clean up
both on land and in the harbour.
New Years day was NOT a day to clean up everyone was shocked by the destruction
of Waka, 75% of Vava'u was destroyed. New Years day for everyone was heart
breaking, no one really had a proper New Years Day, everyone had been awake
for more than 30 hours and the look on a lot of people's faces was very very
sad. This Cyclone was a first time experience for a lot of people both locals
and foreigners and it will be a cyclone, New Years Eve day and New Years day
that no one will ever forget.
THE BIG CLEAN UP DAY'S
The day after New Years everyone and I mean everyone decided to clean up
by starting on the main road getting rid of the trees, roofing, rubbish,
etc and moving the power lines and telephone lines out of the way, it took
at least 3 days to clean up the main road and then everyone concentrated
on cleaning up their own surroundings and rebuilding again. Everyone kept
a smile on their faces and kept on going, what else can we do but try to
rebuild our beautiful Vava'u again. All in all it took at least a good
8 days to get everything clean again and I must tell you Shoreline Electricity
and Tonga Communications were excellent they worked thru the nights and
on Sunday's to restore everyone's Phone's and Electricity, they also did
a great job.
Everyone is still cleaning and trying to rebuild their houses or company
buildings the support that Vava'u got from Australia and New Zealand has
been a great help and we've just heard that France is also sending Aid
money to rebuild the schools and New Zealand has 800 volunteers to come
and rebuild the schools, about 45 primary schools were destroyed and 1
High School which is Channel College.
ALL WE CAN SAY IS WE ALL SURVIVED WAKA AND NO ONE WAS HURT AND THAT'S WHAT
COUNTS.
Once again, thank you everyone for your E-mail messages and your support.” |
Cyclone
Waka hits Tonga
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