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Tusk force joins search
02/01/2005 14:56 - (SA)
Bangkok - Six elephants on Sunday joined a massive recovery operation following Thailand's tidal wave disaster, their owner said.
The six male elephants were brought in two trucks some 860km from the central province of Ayutthaya and have arrived in the devastated southwestern resort town of Khao Lak, he said.
"We arrived at 11:00 and have already started work. Currently two of them are trying to remove felled trees and we have already recovered one corpse," Laithonglian Meepan, chair of the Elephant Camp in Ayutthaya, told AFP.
He said the animals would work where heavy machinery could not go. Fifteen elephant drivers and keepers, or mahouts, are accompanying the elephants.
"Before they work we have mahouts clearing the surrounding area to prevent them from stepping on nails or other sharp wreckage which could hurt their legs," Laithonglian said.
He said his elephants would stay until the task of collecting bodies is complete.
According to official figures 47 708 local and foreign rescue and relief workers are deployed in the six provinces hit by the tsunamis on December 26.
Prisoners who joined the operation were given a sentence reduction.
Thailand's confirmed death toll is almost 5 000, including more than 2 400 foreign holidaymakers, and over 6 424 people are missing.
- AFP
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