IT'S difficult to get to grips with the scale of the scenes of death and destruction we have all witnessed on our TV screens over the past few days.

Here in East Lancashire people have already begun to organise fund-raising events to do what they can to help the many thousands of people who have survived but lost their homes, all their possessions and their livelihoods.

Such help will be welcome but the enormity of this disaster means reconstruction work in as many as ten countries will have to be tackled by governments and international bodies like the United Nations.

While tens of thousands of people in Asia are suffering the misery of human as well as material loss many families in Britain and elsewhere face agonising waits for news of loved ones.

As each day passes emotions become more tortured and in Thailand scores of bodies of Europeans, particularly young backpackers, lay unidentified on beaches.

Thankfully there are a few bits of good news like the welcome relief for the family of Darwen couple Edward and Margaret White who heard last night that they had managed to make their way from stricken Phuket to Bangkok.

But sadly what happened on Boxing Day, 2004 will cast a permanent shadow over the lives of too many others.