2004 Tsunami | rogergale

The 2004 Indian Ocean Boxing Day Tsunami remembered

Sri Lankan children orphaned in the 2004 Tsunami are not forgotten in East Kent. On Boxing Day morning members of KASTDA (The Kent Association for Sri Lankan Tsunami Daruwo) gathered for the ninth year in succession to watch Hansaka Seneviyatne (14) and Hiruni Senaratne (11) lay a wreath in the North Sea in remembrance of the more than thirty thousand Sri Lankans and the hundreds of children left orphaned following the undersea earthquake and tidal wave that followed it.

Since the devastation KASTDA has raised funds to help to educate more than 100 Sri Lankan orphans and 42 still remain to be supported through to the end of their education – the last likely to complete in ten years` time.

Addressing the gathering, which was also attended by Thanet Councillor Alasdair Bruce, KASTDA`s patron, Sir Roger Gale MP, said:

“You deserve the thanks or our own community for the tireless effort that you have put, and continue to put, into fund-raising to help to ensure that some of those young people – the youngest was just two years old at the time – who lost their parents in the Tsunami will receive the funding to support them through their primary, secondary and, where appropriate, University education. That is a tremendous and dedicated long-term commitment that will make a great difference to these young lives”.