DHAKA (AFP) — More than 1,100 people were killed when a powerful cyclone smashed impoverished Bangladesh with huge waves, severe winds and torrential rains, and hundreds more are missing, a report said Friday.
Cyclone Sidr, described as the worst storm in years to hit disaster-prone Bangladesh, crashed into the southwestern coast Thursday night before sweeping north over the capital Dhaka.
The private UNB news agency, quoting unofficial local sources, said over 1,100 lives had been lost and more than 300 people were missing.
Government official Kazi Mokhlechur Rahman, of the home ministry control room, put the the confirmed death toll at 612 and climbing with 192 people unaccounted for.
Wind speeds of 220-240 kilometres (140-155 miles) an hour were recorded as the storm -- visible from space as a huge swirling white mass that moved north from the Bay of Bengal -- left a trail of devastation in poor rural areas.
Earlier, a government official said reports were yet to come in from two districts known to have been worst hit -- southern Barguna and Jhalokati -- because of communication problems.
"We are expecting many dead bodies will be found there," he said.
Most of the victims were killed when trees crushed flimsy homes made from bamboo and tin. In Madaripur district between Dhaka and the southwest coast, an AFP reporter saw devastated villages, one after the other.
Local businessman Mollik Tariqur Rahman told AFP that 80 percent of the homes in his village had been flattened.
"I cannot describe how devastating it was. It was like doomsday, the most frightening five hours of my life. I thought I would never see my family again," he said.
A navy spokesman said five ships had been dispatched with supplies of food, medicine and relief materials.
The European Commission said it was sending 1.5 million euros (2.2 million dollars) in emergency relief aid to the country.
"Preliminary indications are that the most pressing needs will be food, safe drinking water, emergency shelter, clothing, blankets and medicine," Commission spokesman John Clancy told journalists in Brussels.
Rescue workers, however, had yet to reach many remote areas, and roads, telephone lines and power supplies were also cut.
"The electricity went off across the entire country," said Mohammad Iqbal Hossen of Bangladesh's energy ministry.
The storm forced hundreds of thousands of people to spend the night bunkered down in a network of special shelters set up by the government to avoid the mass casualties of previous disasters.
Experts described Sidr as similar in strength to the 1991 storm that triggered a tidal wave, killing an estimated 138,000 people. Another cyclone in 1970 killed up to half a million people.
The head of the Bangladeshi meteorological department, Samarendra Karmakar, said the shelters as well as an evacuation programme should spare the country mass casualties.
"We are expecting less casualties this time because the government took early measures. We alerted people to be evacuated early," he said.
Neighbouring India, which was also bracing for disaster, escaped the worst.
"It's a great relief to us," said the relief minister in India's eastern state of West Bengal, Mortaza Hossain.
About 100,000 villagers in coastal areas of West Bengal were returning home Friday despite heavy rain after being evacuated to temporary camps, he said.
The state's finance minister, Asim Dasgupta, said one man was killed and over a thousand mud huts destroyed on the Indian side.
The storm, which reached Dhaka early Friday, later weakened and crossed the northeastern Sylhet district.
It was expected to progressively lose strength before ending on Saturday just south of the mountain kingdom of Bhutan.
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