A grand mother holds a new born baby who was named Cyclone after he was born during the cyclone stands before her damaged hut in Barishal, 120 kilometers (75 miles) south of Bangladesh's capital Friday, Nov. 16, 2007. A cyclone that slammed into Bangladesh's coast with 240 kph (140 mph) winds killed at least 41 people, leveled homes and forced the evacuation of 650,000 villagers before heading inland and losing power Friday, officials said. (AP Photo/Pavel Rahman)
Cyclone Toll Reaches 1,100 in Bangladesh
DHAKA, Bangladesh (AP) — A cyclone that slammed into the coast with 150 mph winds killed at least 1,100 people, isolating remote towns and villages swamped by a storm surge or hemmed in by piles of debris, aid workers and a Bangladeshi news agency said Friday.
Tropical Cyclone Sidr roared across the country's southwestern coast late Thursday with driving rain and high waves, leveling homes and forcing the evacuation of 650,000 villagers, officials said.
The United News of Bangladesh news agency said reporters deployed across the devastated region made their own count in each affected district and reached a toll of 1,100.
The government, which earlier put the death toll at 242, has acknowledged its trouble keeping count — with power and phone lines down in most remote areas — and said it expected the official number to rise significantly.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.
DHAKA, Bangladesh (AP) — A cyclone that slammed into Bangladesh's coast with 140 mph winds killed at least 425 people before heading inland and losing strength, a local news agency said Friday.
The government, which has acknowledged problems accounting for the dead, has a far lower toll from Tropical Cyclone Sidr. The storm roared across the country's southwestern coast late Thursday with driving rain and high waves, leveling homes and forcing the evacuation of 650,000 villagers, officials said.
Downpours and staggering winds also spawned a water surge 4 feet high that swept through low-lying areas and some offshore islands, leaving them under water, according to Nahid Sultana, an official at a cyclone control room in the capital, Dhaka.
Relief workers struggled Friday to bring aid to areas devastated by the initial impact of storm, even though Sidr had weakened into a tropical storm and was moving across the country to the northeast, with wind speed falling to 37 mph.
The cyclone flattened thousands of flimsy huts, uprooted trees, electricity and telephone poles, and destroyed crops and fish farms in 15 coastal districts, local government officials and witnesses said.
While government estimates had earlier put the death toll at 242, the news agency — which has reporters deployed across the devastated region — said they had made their own count in each affected district.
The government has acknowledged its trouble keeping count. The official disaster control room in Dhaka, the capital, is struggling to collect information with power and phone lines down in most remote areas. But Dalil Uddin, an official with the Ministry of Disaster Management, said Friday evening that the official toll also would go much higher than 242.
"There has been lot of damage to houses made of mud and bamboo and about 60 to 80 percent of the trees have been uprooted," said Vince Edwards, the Bangladesh director of the U.S.-based Christian aid group World Vision.
Edwards said debris from the storm has blocked roads and rivers, making it difficult to reach all the areas that had been hit.
Government teams also fanned out to deliver food and medicine, said Hasanul Amin of the cyclone preparedness program, supported by the government and the Bangladesh Red Crescent Society.
Power and communications in the capital, Dhaka, were also down. Strong winds uprooted trees, snapped power and telecommunication lines and sent billboards flying through the air, injuring several people, said Ashraful Zaman, another official at the cyclone control room.
At least 650,000 coastal villagers moved Thursday to cyclone shelters where they were given emergency rations, Ali Imam Majumder, a senior government official, told reporters in Dhaka.
Bangladesh, a low-lying delta nation, is prone to seasonal cyclones and floods that cause huge losses of life and property. The coastal area borders eastern India and is famous for the mangrove forests of the Sundarbans, a world heritage site that is home to rare Royal Bengal Tigers.
Associated Press writers Parveen Ahmed in Dhaka, Sheikh Didarul Alam in Khulna and Akhter Faruk in Barisal contributed to this report.
Location of Bangladesh.
Powerful  battered Bangladesh, killing hundreds of people, though reports vary. Citing the local ''United News of Bangladesh'', the ''Associated Press'' is reporting a death toll of 1,100. 

An evacuation of some 3 million was attempted before the storm made landfall. Anjana Pasricha reported from  for  that, officials say advance preparation saved many lives, in a country accustomed to natural disasters.

Officials say the cyclone crashed into the country's southern coast Thursday night with winds of up to 240 kilometers an hour, triggering huge waves. 

Many villages were devastated as the winds uprooted trees and flattened homes. Torrential rain and waves washed away crops. Officials say many of the victims were killed by falling trees or debris from collapsing homes.

Shail Shrestha, program coordinator for the  in Dhaka, said preliminary reports indicate that the devastation is widespread.

"Phone lines are cut and communication system is very much disrupted, said Shrestha. "Agriculture products are badly damaged and livestock are also badly damaged."
Tropical Cyclone Sidr as it continued its northward progress over the Bay of Bengal on November 15, 2007. 
The worst of the storm was over by early Friday. This made it possible for government and volunteer teams to dispatch relief teams carrying food, water, medicines, and tents for the people in the affected districts. 

Although the storm has caused considerable destruction, officials say a mass evacuation ordered in advance helped save many lives. 

Hundreds of thousands of coastal villagers were evacuated into government-built cyclone shelters and other buildings as the storm approached. 

The shelters were built after the low-lying country suffered massive casualties in previous cyclones. A storm that hit the country in 1970 killed about half a million people. Another cyclone in 1991 killed more than 130,000.

 is one of the districts that lay in the path of the storm. A senior district official, Mokhlesur Rahman, says the region was spared large-scale casualties. 

"We did evacuate a lot of people into different cyclone shelters, some in educational institutions," said Rahman. "It was of much help, evacuation…. Now they are going back home."

India's east coast was also bracing for the cyclone, but so far it has escaped the storm's fury. Authorities reported that several areas were hit by heavy rain, but there was little damage.