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Educational_Content_Co
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USA
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 Posted - 12/29/2004 : 23:29:59
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By Melanie Coffee
The Associated Press
Published December 28, 2004, 9:10 AM CST
Dipak Jain first knew something was wrong when his sofa trembled as he was having his morning tea at a beach-front resort in Thailand. Then hours later while he was walking back to his hotel, the dean at Northwestern University's business school stopped in his tracks as a gigantic wall of water came barreling toward the building.
The massive wave filled with broken boats, chairs and tables hit a large lagoon just in front of the hotel, missing the structure. ``When the wave started pouring into the lagoon, it reminded me of Niagara Falls,'' Jain said Monday by telephone from just outside Bangkok.
Jain and his family were among the Illinoisans who were in South Asia when an undersea earthquake caused tsunamis that killed more than 44,000 people in nine countries. Jain, dean of the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern, has been in Thailand since Dec. 15 to teach at a school in Bangkok that partners with Kellogg. Jain, his wife, and their three children left Bangkok on Saturday for the island of Phuket.
For the family, Sunday was to be a day of fun at the beach with friends. When Jain felt the earth shake briefly that morning, there didn't seem to be any danger, so the family continued with their plans for breakfast near the beach. Then while returning to the hotel, they saw the tidal wave. The family was less than 100 yards from the wave, but Jain said they were not in danger of getting swept away because much of the water went into the lagoon.``We are very fortunate,'' Jain said. ``When you see things like that, you get a very different perspective on life, you see how short life can be.'' Jain's hotel was later evacuated and with the help of a few friends, he and his family flew out of Phuket and to safety in inland Bangkok.
Copyright C 2004, The Associated Press |
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Kellogg Dean Survives Tsunami
