Where are all the dead animals? Sri Lanka asks

Reuters ^ | 29 Dec 2004 07:21:21 GMT | Reuters

[Rudder]

They left, Jim.

[piasa]

No offense to Mr. H.D. Ratnayake, but I think the people there have better things to do right now than tally up dead animals.

[EternalVigilance]

They were inland drinking mai tais and making jokes about dumb tourists...

[Lancey Howard]

"I think animals can sense disaster. They have a sixth sense. They know when things are happening."

I absolutely believe that.

[DoughtyOne]

I think humans have a lot more intuitive skills than they put to good use. Generally we are too busy to pay attention to the little things. In this type of a situation, those on or very near the beach probably ignored some vital signs that could have warned them of the danger soon to overtake them.

It would be interesting to understand the mechanism that animals used to avoid this situation.

[kayak]

ping

[Salvation]

Instinct

[DoughtyOne]

While you and I would generally agree with what you said, I'll bet that if we were on scene and removing the human remains, at some point it would fairly scream out at us, that although we had removed hundreds of dead humans, not a dog, cat, rat, cow, horse or other animal seemed to be amongst the dead.

That would seem rather earie to me.

[Gondring]

Many of the interviews I've seen have had the people mentioning the classic signs of impending tsunami strikes, but they were ignorant of what they were observing. Also, how many elephants were at the beach?

I hear the fish were doing fine.

[GeronL]

they got eaten by people who were stranded and hungry

[DoughtyOne]

Elephants tend to go in the off season. They don't like the large crowds.

[GVnana]

Interesting. The Chinese ask their public to watch for rats fleeing and other odd animal behavior as warning of earthquakes. Here in CA, a noted geologist (who's name I don't recall at this moment) watches the number of adds in the Bay Area newspapers for lost pets. Significant increases just before earthquakes.

This may lead to some of the best evidence yet of animals sensing an impending quake.

[Prophet in the wilderness]

For the animals, I did hear reports of dead animals in the mix with dead human remains, but, for the most part, Animals have better sense to run away from danger.
I heard reports that some of those people actually went down to the beaches to see what a TSUMANI is like and were " SIGHT SEEING " to see the action that was going on , but, " IGNORNIG " the danger signs of the ocean surf, i.e. the tide going out faster than normal, seeing the wave coming in from miles out.
It's true about the old saying " Curiosity KILLED THE CAT " and those people, mainly tourist were " CURIOUS " because they never seen anything like it, and wanted to SEE , but, were to stupid to get away from danger. But the main burden of responsibility should be blamed on those governments of those countries who ignored that warnings, and didn't warn the public of the earthquake, and the possibility of a tsunami hitting those coastlines. They should have had some kind of warning system in place, even if it was a crude system.

[propertius]

No, out of all animals thnk the fish were worst affected. Millions were marooned on dry ground when tides went out and therefore died....

[Mr Ramsbotham]

It would be interesting to understand the mechanism that animals used to avoid this situation.

All animals are perceptive to changes in the environment; even those of which they're not consciously aware. The nervous system becomes inured to the status quo, and responds when background stimuli reach a threshold beyond the norm. Certainly changes in seismic conditions would stress animals, and there might even be a built-in mechanism that would cause them to move to higher ground.

It would be damned interesting to be able to get feedback from human survivors of this devastating incident to see whether any of them experienced any inexplicable stress immediately after the earthquake hit; or whether domestic animals showed any unusual signs of distress.

[DoughtyOne]

Thanks for your report on the animals. I'd agree with you about the need for an elementary system. How hard could it be to interrupt the local popular radio stations and broadcast a warning to evacuate the beach areas for a few hours?

[Political Junkie Too]

"So long, and thanks for all the fish."

-PJ

[propertius]

yet hippopotami were dragged out to sea from inland rivers in Kenya. Suppose there was little they could have done about that, though.

[investigateworld]

bump