Counting the casualties in a holiday haven

By GREG ANSLEY

BALI - It is 1am on Monday, and Jakarta embassy official Nigel Alladyce and defence attaché Colonel Alan Goodwin are still searching the hospitals of Bali for New Zealanders injured by the terrorist bombings on Kuta Beach.

At this time of the morning, the best count is 11, but no one is yet sure.

On walls behind them are long lists of the missing, with pleas for news, others matching the names of the more than 150 injured to the hospitals understood to have accepted them, and a brief, tragic list of Australians, Balinese, German, Dutch, French, Singaporean, Swedish, British and Equadorean dead so far named.

Twenty-fours afters after the bombs ripped apart the peace of the island resort, 151 have yet to be identified.

"The hardest thing here is the morgue," an exhausted volunteer says. "It's the morgue."

In Wellington Foreign Minister Phil Goff is reported to have said that one New Zealand is known to have been killed.

This is news to Alladyce and Goodwin, trudging through the packed wards and confusion of overstretched hospitals trying to locate 11 Kiwis known to have been hurt and taken for care, most with burns.

"To my knowledge at this stage we have no confirmation of any New Zealand dead," Goodwin says.

But even finding the living is hard.

"I've got a handle on about half a dozen people, and I've physically seen only two," he says. "That's how difficult it is."

Wellingtonian Michael Going, suffering burns to 10-15 per cent of his body, mainly the upper body and legs, has been moved to the care of a New Zealand Army medical team in Singapore.

Andrew Crook, originally from Wellington, has also been taken to Singapore - where he now lives - by an aircraft chartered by a group of insurance companies.

Others may be sent to Darwin on one of three RAAF C130 Hercules flying out wounded Australians and New Zealanders.

Hospital volunteers desperate for information seek almost as much information from journalists as they are able to give.

Miros is at Sangrah Hospital working as a volunteer.

"They give me the food. I bring it here. That's my contribution," he says.

At 1.30 am Monday, he is waiting for another delivery of food.

Already, shocked Balinese have begun mourning for their visitors.

A wreath and two red roses, with notes of sympathy, have been tied to the gates of the Australian consulate.

"In amongst the foreigners who have been injured there are the people who work in the bars, the taxi drivers....they're among the injured as well," Goodwin says.

"Bali until now has had a very good reputation as being a fairly safe place.

"Now the Balinese are going to be the people who suffer in the long term."

"This is a huge thing for Bali," says an Australian volunteer who wants to be known only as Dee.

"These are peaceful people. This is a peaceful island. Bali was never prepared for this."

Bali messages

New Zealand travellers in Bali, and their families in New Zealand, can post messages on our Bali Messages page.

Foreign Affairs advice to New Zealanders

* Travellers should defer travel to Bali

* NZers in Bali should keep a low profile and remain calm

* Foreign Affairs Hotline: 0800 432 111

Feature: Bali bomb blast

Pictures from the scene of the blast

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