NZ woman’s terror ride out to sea

Jessica Atkinson

It was early morning on one of the most beautiful beaches in the world when New Zealander Katie Hill was forced to run for her life.

She had been sitting on the beach of Thailand's Phi Phi Island. In the tourist cabin behind her, friend Jessica Atkinson was out of bed early doing her washing.

The pair, aged 27, were holidaying together on a coastline portrayed as a paradise in the Hollywood film The Beach when they were hit by the tsunami that has devastated Southeast Asia.

Hill leaped from the sand, turned and ran, but was picked up by the raging waters. They carried her on to the verandah of a two-storey building which gave her shelter when the worst of the tsunami struck.

Then the waters picked her up again, sweeping her out to sea surrounded by flotsam and debris. She was finally rescued by a Thai fisherman, who took her to safety.

The cabin where she had stayed with Atkinson was picked up by the tsunami and swept away.

Distraught, Hill called her father, John Hill, in Auckland from Phuket Hospital.

Meanwhile Jessica Atkinson's mother, Ros Morton, spent most of yesterday ringing the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, desperate to find out if her daughter was alive.

Then finally, in the afternoon, she heard her daughter's voice down the phone line.

Mr Hill said his daughter was in Phuket working on a yacht, and Jessica had been visiting her from Auckland.

Phi Phi Island was one of the worst-hit stretches of coastline - 200 bungalows at two resorts were swept out to sea along with some of their staff and customers.

"I'm afraid that there will be a high figure of foreigners missing in the sea and also my staff," said Chan Marongtaechar, owner of the PP Princess Resort and PP Charlie Beach Resort.

Staff told him they were "very scared, they want to leave the island," but the seas were too rough.