Mon 3 Jan 2005
Mother tells how she braved terrifying white wall of water
A MOTHER who was photographed running towards a killer wave in a desperate attempt to save her children survived the tsunami disaster, along with her loved ones, it emerged yesterday.
Karin Svaerd, whose captured rescue attempt was published in newspapers around the world, including The Scotsman, rushed to rescue her three sons but had failed to reach them when the tsunami swept them off the beach at Krabi, in southern Thailand.
Speaking for the first time about the moments before her race towards the wall of white water, the Swedish policewoman said: "I had to try to save my children; nothing was going to stop me.
"Terror was coming up inside me, but I was so focused I just started running to my family."
Her husband Lars, 40, was also running towards them.
Ms Svaerd, 37, was pictured running towards a 20ft-high wave to save her sons Anton, 14, Filip, 11, and Viktor, ten.
She said: "I was running towards them. I could see this white wall coming to me - I did not care. I was looking at my children. I wanted to hold them and care for them."
Ms Svaerd was engulfed by water and eventually washed up on to higher ground. She then faced an agonising search for her family. She said: "By this time, I thought my family were dead. My life was over as far as I could see it. My children were taken away from me."
Ms Svaerd and her family were reunited when she found them clinging together.
She said: "I rushed to them and yelled, ‘Thank God you are alive.’ We hugged each other. All around us, people were shouting for their families, and I could feel their fear."
The family’s miraculous escape was revealed as the Foreign Office confirmed that the British death toll from the disaster had risen to 40.
Details of other dramatic escapes emerged, including the survival of a Sri Lankan schoolgirl who spent more than 24 hours in shark-infested seas after she was swept away by the tsunami.
Sylvia Lucas, 11, was playing on a beach in the village of Pasikudha, north of Batticaloa, on the east coast of Sri Lanka, when she was washed out to sea by the huge tidal wave that destroyed her community. As the youngster floated offshore, she managed to grab a log and then spent more than 24 hours clinging to it, desperately hoping to be rescued.
The girl, whose father is English, described how she saw people being lifted from the water by a rescue helicopter in the distance but said she was too small to attract attention. During her ordeal, she said she had to fend off a "large fish" that was circling her in the water.
She said: "Although I was frightened, I was confident that I would be saved.
"I was on the beach playing with coconut husks, I am always playing on the beach and in the water, so staying in the sea so long didn’t really scare me," Sylvia added.
Explaining the details of her dramatic rescue, she revealed that, after almost 28 hours at sea, she spotted a Sri Lankan helicopter flying over her and she frantically waved her arms. She was eventually lifted from the water to safety.
Another member of Sylvia’s family were not so lucky: her brother was killed by the waves. Her parents survived, however, and while they are being housed in an emergency shelter, she is being looked after by a local organisation, Thadaham, a partner of Christian Aid.
Tragic stories also emerged yesterday of parents being forced to choose which of their children to save as huge waves engulfed their homes.
In Chinnakapalet, southern India, a housewife had to choose which of her three sons to pick up as a tidal wave swept through her house, grabbing the youngest two and running to escape the torrent of water.
Her eldest, only seven, was later saved from the water by the family dog, who grabbed the collar of his shirt.
In the Thai resort of Phuket, Jillian Searle, an Australian mother of two, faced a similarly heartbreaking choice. She was forced to let go of one of her toddler sons as she tried to stay upright in the torrent of water that swept her resort. Holding her two-year-old boy above the water, she slipped her hand from Lachlan, five, and watched him drift off. Two hours later, the family were reunited - Lachlan had stayed alive by clinging to a door.
As more corpses were pulled from the Andaman Sea coastline, officials in Thailand announced an international task force to oversee the task of identifying victims. Officials said the process of taking dental X-rays, fingerprints and DNA samples, and matching them to surviving families "will take many months to complete", and admitted some bodies may never be identified.
There are often odd, unusual and controversial items up for sale on eBay - multi-million euro planes, the Pope's old car and a young woman's virginity, to name just a few. But how about the Prime Minister's shoes? 

Shoes custom designed for former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher have been put up for sale on eBay. The shoes, which have a reserve price of £2,930 (US $3,580), are currently owned by 65 year old Eleanor Graham. Ms. Graham bought them in a Sue Ryder charity shop after seeing a member of Thatcher's staff drop them in the shop. She guessed that they would increase in value over the years, so Ms. Graham purchased them.

The Rayne shoes - which come in gold, silver and black suede - are size five and come with a letter received in 2001 from Ms Thatchers office confirming that she did wear Rayne shoes. 

You can see the shoes at eBay by clicking  here.