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epa01957780 A picture dated on 29 December 2004 shows a man fleeing from the smoke after his damaged house caught fire from the mass cremation in Nagapattinam, 350 Km south of Madras, India. On 26 December 2004, 00:58 (UTC), 07:58 (Local Time, Indonesia), a great earthquake occurred off the west coast of northern Sumatra, Indonesia. The magnitude of this earthquake was 9.0 and this was the fourth largest earthquake in the world since 1900. The main shock occurred off the west coast of Sumatra Island and the aftershocks extended northward along an approximately 1,000 km rupture zone. The tsunami that accompanied this earthquake propagated over the entire Indian Ocean and caused extensive and significant damage. The reported number of casualties were approximately 300,000: 230,000 killed in Indonesia (earthquake and tsunami), at least 29,000 killed in Sri Lanka (tsunami), more than 10,000 in India (tsunami), more than 5,000 in Thailand (tsunami), and 82 killed in the Maldives (tsunami), and more than 22,000 are still missing. EPA/HARISH TYAGI