Plight of bodies denies even dignity in death

By GREG ANSLEY and MATHEW DEARNALEY

Freezers have been flown to Bali from Australia and Britain in a desperate bid to keep scores of bodies from decomposing before anguished relatives can identify them.

The Australian Defence Force yesterday delivered five refrigeration units, each capable of storing 12 to 17 bodies, and two more were due from Britain.

Balinese authorities had previously managed to find only a handful of refrigerated units, including one on a dilapidated truck borrowed from a local fisherman, to store bodies and limbs from the weekend's savage bomb blasts in Kuta Beach.

They are collecting ice from wherever they can find it, even scouring hotel bars, to pack around other bodies in the tropical heat of the main hospital's morgue.

A hospital official told the Herald that the morgue was equipped to store only 12 to 16 corpses at the best of times, and just 44 out of 181 bodies had been identified by yesterday afternoon, most by facial recognition.

Hospital authorities hope the rest can be identified within a week, despite immense problems in trying to match dental records and other clues to charred bodies.

Five refrigerated units were stationed outside the hospital yesterday, each packed with numbered body bags which officials did not want to risk opening without relatives present, because of a heavy stench mixed with diesel fumes from the generator.

But it was not until Monday, more than a day after the bombing, that the first refrigerated truck was brought in with a mobile generator to stop dozens of bodies from deteriorating.

The back wall of the morgue was yesterday strewn with floral wreaths in the Balinese Hindu style, and one corridor was stacked four-high with ornately carved coffins after the island's renowned artisans switched production from tourist souvenirs to more sombre work.

Bodies which had already been identified were stored in orange and yellow bags, some laid out in a rear courtyard, while unidentified corpses and dismembered parts remained in black bags.

One entire room at the hospital was used to store yet-to-be identified body parts, some of which had been pulled from the rubble as late as the previous night.

In one hospital, a small army of volunteers - tattooed backpackers in flip-flops, Balinese college students, a local Lions Club chapter - were trying to make sense of the disaster.

"You have to do something," said Agung Suryanata, a 29-year-old Balinese management student who showed up at Sanglah Hospital with more than a dozen classmates, prepared to take a turn on the night shift carrying out bodies.

For the time being, though, he was doing a lot of standing around.

"We're just confused about what to do," he said, looking at the swirl of humanity. "Nobody says do this or do that."

It wasn't really clear just how it was working at Sanglah, but it was working, a do-it-yourself morgue and information clearinghouse just where it was needed most.

Still, there was plenty to do.

"We clean rooms of rubbish ... We serve coffee. We carry body bags to the refrigerated container. We do anything that they tell us to," said Mark Parthezius, 24, who was volunteering with his parents. The family, Australians, have been living in Bali for 10 years.

"I am very tired," said his mother, Nanette. "I spent the whole day matching photographs to their badly burned-out faces. It was very draining mentally."

For some volunteers, working at the hospital was a personal burden.

In the parking lot, taking a break from the horror of the morgue, an Australian man stared blankly at the building.

He was there to find a co-worker who had been around the Sari Club on the night of the explosion. But since only a small group of colleagues knew the man was missing, he didn't want to give his, or his co-worker's name.

"He's not accounted for," the man said, still staring at the morgue. "So we have to try to find him."

Authorities are meanwhile appealing to relatives and friends to keep sending photos of their loved ones and descriptions of tattoos, wedding rings and other notable features.

A constant stream of people were still turning up yesterday with pieces of descriptive information phoned or emailed to them from families of feared bomb victims from up to 12 countries, including New Zealand.

Australia's Deputy Ambassador to Indonesia, Neil Mules, said his country had supplied refrigeration units to relieve the ordeal of relatives and friends dismayed by the poor state of makeshift morgue facilities.

"It has been very difficult and obviously very distressing for relatives and friends who haven't been happy with this," he said on Australian television.

The Australian Prime Minister, John Howard, said yesterday that his Government would pay the costs of repatriating Australian remains.

It would also pay the bill for Australians who had to go to Bali to assist with identification.

Seventeen Australian federal police are already on Bali to help with identification, and with the criminal investigation by their Indonesian counterparts into the bombings.

Officials are deciding whether also to send a team of forensic scientists from Australia, for DNA testing of bodies that cannot be otherwise identified.

Foreign Minister Phil Goff said members of the family of a New Zealander feared dead were on their way to Bali via Australia to help diplomats trying to identify their loved one.

A crisis centre of volunteers both from Bali and outside Indonesia has been set up at the main hospital to help to comfort relatives.

- ADDITIONAL REPORTING: AGENCIES


Bali messages and latest information on New Zealanders
New Zealand travellers in Bali, and their families around the world, can exchange news via our Bali Messages page. The page also contains lists of New Zealanders in Bali and their condition.

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

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