Tsunami remembrance ceremony held on Thailand’s Patong Beach

Residents, tourists and provincial dignitaries gathered on Wednesday morning at Patong Beach for a remembrance ceremony commemorating 14 years since the deadly tsunami that struck on the morning of December 26, 2004.

The ceremony, presided over by Patong Mayor Chalermluck Kebsup, started at 9am. Flowers were placed on Patong Beach to remember those that died in the disaster.

The tsunami killed an estimated 5,398 people in Thailand and more than 3,700 vanished in the waves that struck Phuket and the Andaman coast.

In total, the disaster claimed an estimated 230,000 to 280,000 lives across the Indian Ocean, with a focus on the Banda Aceh region of Indonesia.