by Pesi Fonua

Injured Korean businessman, Song Sanghoom 42, considered himself lucky to be still alive today, after jumping from the second floor of the Pacific Royale Hotel, in Nuku'alofa early this morning as a Magnitude 7.9 earthquake rocked the Pacific islands from an epicentre close to Tonga.

When he decided to jump, "I was sure that I could make it..." said Song covering his face with his hands from a sudden rush of pain from the lower part of his body where he landed, "but, it was stupid. I am very ashamed."

Song said that his decision to jump was based on his experience in a devastating earthquake in Taiwan in 1997 when about 2,000 people were killed. Song with the help of his left hand demonstrated that when this morning's violent quake stopped going sideways, and started to move up and down that was when he decided it was time to jump. He landed in the inner courtyard of the hotel next to the swimming pool.

Matangi Tonga Online was told by the hotel staff that one of their guests had been taken to hospital, but when we contacted Vaiola Hospital neither the Surgery ward or the Medical ward had admitted any earthquake victims.

Waiting in Outpatients

But at around noon we found Song who was still lying in the Outpatients department on a plastic mattress on a trolley where he had been for around seven hours since arriving at the hospital at about 5 a.m. He was using his jeans as a pillow with a single white sheet over his bruised body and attached to a drip, but said that he had been begging for some pain-killers.

But why had Song been lying in the Outpatients all this time?

According to an attendant at Vaiola, Song was to be x-rayed but the lift was broken by the earthquake and the trolley could not be transferred to the second floor.

It is incredible to think that the hospital staff could not stretcher Song up to the second floor, instead of making him wait for the lift to be fixed. It is a public holiday in Tonga today, the birthday of the Crown Prince Tupouto'a and the technical staff were obviously on holiday.

Song is the General Manager of a company that is engaged in the processing of seaweeds. He said that he first came to Tonga in December 2005, and since then had been travelling back and forth to Korea, and he had returned to Tonga in February.

Earthquake downgraded to Major

Meanwhile, Seismologists who intially reported the Tonga earthquake to be a Great Earthquake at Magnitude 8, had later today downgraded it to a Major Earthquake at Magnitude 7.9.