- COLOMBO (Reuters) - Sri Lankan
wildlife officials are stunned -- the worst tsunami in memory has killed
around 22,000 people along the Indian Ocean island's coast, but they can't
find any dead animals.
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- Giant waves washed floodwaters up to 3 km (2 miles) inland
at Yala National Park in the ravaged southeast, Sri Lanka's biggest wildlife
reserve and home to hundreds of wild elephants and several leopards.
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- "The strange thing is we haven't recorded any dead
animals," H.D. Ratnayake, deputy director of the national Wildlife
Department, told Reuters on Wednesday.
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- "No elephants are dead, not even a dead hare or
rabbit," he added. "I think animals can sense disaster. They
have a sixth sense. They know when things are happening."
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- At least 40 tourists, including nine Japanese, were drowned.
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- The tsunami was triggered by an earthquake in the Indian
Ocean on Sunday, which sent waves up to 5-metres (15-feet) high crashing
onto Sri Lanka's southern, eastern and northern seaboard, flooding whole
towns and villages, destroying hotels and causing widespread destruction.
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