Tsunami toll nears 30,000

Officials in Sri Lanka said today that nearly 19,000 people had died, and estimated that the toll in that country alone could rise to 25,000. More than 6,000 people were killed in Indonesia, more than 4,000 in India and more than 1,000 in Thailand.It was the deadliest known tsunami since the one caused by the 1883 eruption of the Krakatoa volcano, also located off Sumatra, which killed an estimated 36,000 people. Officials in Thailand and Indonesia conceded that immediate public warnings of the waves could have saved lives. The only known warning issued by Thai authorities reached resort operators when it was too late. The waves hit Sri Lanka and India more than two hours later. But governments insisted they couldn't have known the true danger because there is no international system in place to track tsunamis in the Indian Ocean, and they could not afford the sophisticated equipment to build one.