Posted on 10/13/2002 8:05:25 AM PDT by dennisw
| Holiday haven turns to hell on earth October 13 2002 Charred and limbless bodies were strewn across the road as terrified foreign tourists, some with clothes on fire and drenched in blood, stumbled through the carnage of the Bali blast. In seconds the bustling nightspots in the popular Legian resort overnight were transformed into an inferno which left at least 110 people dead and many more injured. The bomb erupted at about 11pm (0100 AEST) just as the nightclubs were beginning to fill up, and the restaurants and roads were brimming with people eating or strolling. "I was sitting at a table about 100 metres away when there was a mild explosion followed three or four seconds later by a very powerful one. I hurled myself to the ground," said Karim Ansel, 27, from Paris. "Everybody was shouting and screaming, there was dust all over the place. Somebody asked me if an aeroplane had fallen on top of us," said a shocked Ansel, who arrived in Bali on holiday 10 days ago. "As I came out I saw awful, awful things. One person was absolutely covered in blood, another woman was running with her clothes burned onto her body. "A man was dressed only in his underpants and covered in blood, with his shoes in his hands. Other people were just completely traumatised." Ansel said most of those injured were foreign tourists, although some local taxi drivers and parking attendants were hurt. The explosion completely destroyed two nightclubs and many surrounding shops, blowing out windows in a 500-metre radius. "There are charred and mangled bodies everywhere, it is unbelievable," said French photographer Cyril Terrien at the scene. "I have never seen such an appalling thing in my life. "It is still burning. From where I was, I saw burned and mutilated bodies, this is really difficult to describe. The bodies of Indonesians and foreigners are lying side by side. "People are stumbling around in the road as if they are in a trance. There were many people in this place because the Sari Club was one of the most popular nightspots here," said Terrien. He said the local rescue services were totally overwhelmed by the scale of the carnage and struggled to ferry the injured to hospital around 15km away in the Bali capital Denpasar. Ansel said hundreds of tourists fled their hotel rooms and spent the night on the beach with their belongings. Others camped out in hotel lobbies. Australian tourist Rachael Hughes, 18, said she and her boyfriend had just arrived when the blast occurred, smashing the window of their hotel room. "Standing in the foyer of the Bounty Hotel, people were just walking in, blood dripping off them, burns to their face, skin coming off them. "It was really a terrible sight. You could just hear people crying up in the Bounty foyer - obviously they have lost loved ones or friends." The blaze was still burning fiercely as the sun rose on the shell-shocked island, which had until now managed to escape the violence that has wracked Indonesia since the fall of dictator Suharto in 1998. The authorities on the island were now bracing for an exodus of tourists. "I am going to the airport. I want to take the first flight out, I can't stay here any more," said Ansel. AFP |
And that was the purpose of the bomb(s). To send them all packing.
Mission accomplished.
About 90% of Indonesia is Muslum. Militias there persecute the minorities while the government twiddles its thumbs. They don't deserve a tourist industry. Anyone who goes to a Muslem country on vactation is risking their lives.
And now that country will lose tourism, one of its only sources of foreign income, further accelerating its fall into poverty and violence and islamonazism.. blah
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