[Brilliant]

My guess is that there was not enough time to do anything anyway. Less than an hour is not much time to communicate info like that to such a wide area. The fact that none of the 24 nations that were warned did anything with the info seems to prove the point, I think.

[Melpomene]

They could have at least gotten them off of the beaches and away from the coastline, or off of the ground floors of their hotels.

[TomGuy]

My guess is that there was not enough time to do anything anyway. Less than an hour is not much time to communicate info like that to such a wide area.

The waves went inland approximately 2 miles, per some reports. Had 'visitors' been given even 30 minutes of warning, they could have traveled to a much safer area in that amount of time.

Many of the deaths were families strolling along beaches and playing in the water. They were there on vacation.

[beyond the sea]

My guess is that there was not enough time to do anything anyway. Less than an hour is not much time to communicate info like that to such a wide area.

I have to disagree. They could have easily gotten many people away from the rising waters in many resorts and other beach-side areas.

Of course there were many isolated islands, etc. that would never have gotten the word, but the word SHOULD have been spread! This was partially a man-made tragedy.