Disaster Fatigue

Those who remained could do little. "It was much worse than I could have imagined," said Preben Basse, the leader of a cyclone protection project at the sea resort of Cox's Bazar, near the Myanmar border. "Throughout the night I heard people scream. In the morning, a trail of devastation was all around."

Some faulted the government for not ordering an outright evacuation. But there will be time enough for secondguessing. For now, the task is to contain the suffering.

RON MOREAU, JEFFREY BARTHOLET and JANE WHITMORE

© 1991