Tsunami leaves 1,000 homeless

Landslides and a tsunami left about a third of the people on a Solomon island homeless, but lives were saved as residents with memories of previous disasters fled quickly to higher ground, officials said.

From the air, extensive damage could be seen on Rendova, a remote western island, after a 7.2-magnitude tremor triggered the landslides in the Pacific Solomon Islands on Monday. No injuries had been reported some 30 hours after the biggest in a series of quakes churned a tsunami that was up to three metres high as it ploughed into the coast. However, more than 1,000 people have been affected after some 200 houses were destroyed.