Rich, poor. Old, young. Famous and unknown. 15 lost lives that symbolise a disaster without boundaries STORY OF THE WEEK

On Thursday, on the BBC News website, the reply finally came. "I'm afraid to tell you that Heinz and his two daughters did not survive, but Oiy and Dino are alive, as are the rest of the Moskito staff. I was working there when it happened.

Phi Phi island was devastated by the tsunami. Around 200 bungalows at two resorts were swept out to sea.

Willy Akhiar, Indonesia

Twelve-year-old Willy was playing football with his friends when the tsunami hit his Indonesian village. His father, hotelierMohammed Akhiar, spent four days searching for his body, but has now accepted that his son has been "buried at sea".

"He was such a creative boy, and clever, too, " said Mohammed. "He could change lightbulbs and fix plugs. His teacher said he was destined to be a success. On Saturday, he followed me around all day as if he knew something was going to happen. He was wearing a black shirt. I have often wondered if that was an omen or something."

Akhiar has spent hours walking along the beaches near his home, but has given up hope of finding him alive. "He is buried at sea, " he said. "And I will send a prayer to him there."

Kali Breisch (USA)

Fifteen-year-old Kali Breisch, from Salt Lake City, loved pointed shoes and Abercrombie and Fitch clothing. This is all her father, Stu, has to identify her as he searches the tangled wreckage of rubble and decaying bodies on Khao Lak beach, Thailand.

When the tsunami hit, Kali was asleep next to her brother, Jai, in a bungalow in the newly-opened Emerald Resort. They were woken by screams, pulled the curtain back and the big wave crashed through the window and tore them away.

Jai is alive, having ridden the torrent of water until he was dumped inland. He did not see Kali again. Stu, his wife and other daughter, Shonti, were out on a diving trip and returned to find Kali's belongings scattered 300 yards up the beach.

There are no police or rescue workers in the area, leaving Stu, an emergency-room doctor, to search through the debris himself. "I can't help feeling she doesn't want us to find her like this, " says Shonti. "My Dad goes to the morgue every night to look for her and the bodies are in terrible condition.

Maybe she doesn't want us to see her or remember her like that."

Lucy Attenborough (UK)

Richard Attenborough's granddaughter, Lucy Attenborough, was one of the first Britons confirmed to have died at the hands of the tsunami. Lucy, 14, was on a two-week holiday at a resort in Phuket, with her sister, Alice, 17, their brother, Sam, and their parents. Theirmother, Jane Holland, and hermother-in law, also Jane Holland, are both still missing.

Lord Attenborough, who directed Chaplin and Gandhi and starred in Jurassic Park, has been grieving in private with his wife and his other daughter, Charlotte, and son, Michael.

He had recently spoken of a fond memory of taking a three-year-old Lucy to see the film Miracle on 34th Street, in which he played Father Christmas. "She said: 'Grandpa, you can't sit next to me'. I asked herwhy not, and she said: 'You have to be up on the screen.' It was a wonderful first reaction to a film."

Naoko Kakinoki, Japan

Every year, Naoko Kakinoki's company, Orient Trading of Tokyo, rewards its most outstanding employees with a trip abroad. Naoko, from Fukuoka Prefecture, was sent to Phuket for her hard work, and, at 27, was the youngest to have been given the reward.

She had been out in her canoe for a few minutes when the tsunami crashed on the shore. Her sister said: "I so wish I could have seen herwhile she was still alive.

But I suppose it was good enough that she was eventually found by hermother and father."

Naoko's parents flew out to Phuket on Tuesday, having been told that the body had been found. It was not, however, their daughter's. Naoko's body was found a few hours later.

Naoko is among 17 Japanese citizens who have been confirmed dead. Kaito Yoshino, eight, was the son of first secretary at the Japanese Embassy in Bangkok. Three more unnamed children are also still missing. One girl was found dead in the southern Thai resort city of Krabi, near Phuket.

Catherine Mullan, UK

Louis Barratt Mullan, 16, and his 12-yearold brother, Theo, pinned a note to the door at Takua Pa hospital asking for their parents to get in touch. It read: "Louis and Theo Barratt Mullan are safe and all right. We are looking for ourmother and father. Try to contact us, Mum and Dad.

We are with friends we met here."

Relatives from Bradford are flying out to collect the brothers who are staying with a family. Catherine Mullan, 53, and her husband, Leonard Barratt, 49, from Truro, Cornwall, are missing presumed dead in Phuket, Thailand.

Phillo Mullan, the boys' aunt, told reporters she had spoken to them. "Louis on the phone sounded amazingly good and I think he's rallying for himself and his younger brother. But for them to lose both their parents in such circumstances, well you can't really imagine how they feel."

Colleagues said of Catherine: "She is a lovely woman, always bright. She brought a sparkle to the office."

Kokila and Muraganna, India

Kokila, five, and her sisterMuraganna, two, had come to the harbour in Tharangambadi to watch the fishing boats come in. Suddenly, everyone began screaming. Their grandmother, Chinnapillai, grabbed them and began running. They never looked back. The waterwashed over them and threw Chinnapillai, on to a cottage. When she looked back, her grandchildren had vanished.

Chinnapillai, 60, is now so overwhelmed with guilt she has stopped eating. Just a fewweeks ago, she had insisted that her daughter and grandchildren leave their village and come and live with her, because of domestic troubles in their home.

"I killed the children, " she told the NewYorkTimes. "I forced them to come to my house."

Her daughter, Banumathi, 22. had gone to the temple in her home village that morning. Kokila and Muraganna had begged to go with her, but she had said no. She cried and cried again. "If only I had taken them with me" she said.

She is not alone. More than 200 bodies have been found in Tharangambadi in the aftermath of the tsunami - 84 of them are children.

Isabella Peatfield, UK

Five-year-old Isabella Peatfield, from the village of Mappleton nearAshbourne in Derbyshire, died in the disasterwhile on holiday in Sri Lanka with her parents Kim, 40, and Tristan, 39. Her brother, 10-year-old Oliver, is not thought to have been with the family on holiday.

A bouquet has been laid beside a tree in front of Isabella's school along with a card that reads: "In our thoughts and prayers we remember you giggling and bouncing at a recent party. Giggle and bounce in heaven."

A governor of her school, Ilam Primary, said yesterday: "We are aware that one of our pupils was on a family holiday in Sri Lanka over the Christmas period.

Everyone connected with the school has been anxiously waiting for news about our pupil and her family . . . Our thoughts are with all the victims of the tsunami tragedy."

Barana Tillynona, Sri Lanka

Barana lived in Magalle, a village on the southern Sri Lankan coast, all her life.

She was 76 when she died, having been swept away to sea.

Barana married when she was 18, and stayed in the village to bring up seven children. Her son, Handry, said she loved being around children, and he was just grateful that she had died not knowing that her 11-year-old granddaughter had died in the tragedy, too.

Piers Simon, UK

The friends and family of 33-year-old Piers Simon, a garden designer from Somerset, have had an agonising few days. Yesterday they confirmed that his body had been identified, after days of uncertainty. His younger brother, Luke, had been searching for him relentlessly since the disaster.

The 33-year-old from Chilthorne Domer, nearYeovil, Somerset, died when a tidal wave hit the Phi Phi island cafe where he had been breakfasting with four friends. Luke contacted his father, Harry Simon, in the early hours of yesterday morning to tell him the body had finally been identified in Krabi. Luke, an English teacher in the northern Thai city of Chiang Mai, was still in Thailand yesterday, but will be returning home with Piers's body in the next week.

Piers's father, a retired cattle auctioneer, said: "It's just heartbreaking, Luke phoned us this morning with the news.

The body was identified by Luke from photographs - there was no doubt about it. Piers's passport was in the pocket of his shorts along with the passport of one of his friends. We, as a family, want to make a tribute to Piers but, at the moment, it's just a bit too raw."

Steven Leung Sai-wai, Hong Kong

Many relatives have not been able to reach the 388 Hong Kong citizens believed to be in the disaster areas, according to Ambrose Lee, Hong Kong's secretary for security.

About 325 of them were thought to be in Thailand. British-born Steven Leung Sai-wai, 39, who had been living in Hong Kong, is among those who are thought to have died in the country.

Steven's wife told Hong Kong immigration officers in the Thai resort island of Phuket of the death, the first reported Hong Kong casualty of the quake, according to a government statement.

It was reported that a Hong Kongbased German national, HolgerDreher, and two of his children ? ages six and 12 ? were also missing after being swept away at the southwestern Thai beach of Khao Lak. Dreher's wife, Tong Choi-yin of Hong Kong, survived along with one of his sons.

Jayantha Banduwathi (Sri Lanka)

Jayantha Banduwathi worked in a textile shop on the waterfront at Galle, a port in southern Sri Lanka. After the wave hit, the shop was reduced to rubble and scattered torn cloth. Jayantha was last seen being swept out to sea.

He and his brother, also missing, worked almost every day to earn the money to feed, house and clothe their mother, D K Banduwathi. She is now homeless, after the tsunami destroyed her timber shack and stole all her belongings, save for a red vinyl handbag and a small plastic statue of Buddha.

Taylor Howard, UK

Six-year-old Taylor Howard grew up near Boscastle, the Cornish town shaken by flash floods in August.

Andrew Mitchell, a friend of his family, remarked on hearing the news of the boy's death: "And now something which happened halfway around the world goes and hits right home to our doorstep."

Taylor's brother, eight-year-old Mason, is missing presumed dead, as is David Page, the 44-year-old fiance of Taylor's mother, Sharon.

Sharon's parents, Trevor and Rita Coop, said that she had heard from the family on Christmas Day, and the family had told her the family were having a wonderful holiday.

"We are obviously devastated. We are an extremely close-knit family and saw Sharon and the boys every day, " they said.

"Taylor and Mason were such beautiful boys but very different in personality. Taylorwas the more outgoing of the two, while Mason was more studious. Both loved swimming and were having golf lessons. They were very close and always slept in the same room."

Sharon had been proposed to by David only hours before her sons and husband-to-be went missing. "We would have been proud to have had David as a son-in-law, " said her parents. "He was exceptionally kind and generous and adored the children. Our thoughts are with his family."

Brian Clayton (Australia)

Brian Clayton died trying to save drowning children caught up in the tsunami. Clayton, 58, was on holiday with his wife, Patsy, on the island of Phuket, which the childhood sweethearts loved to visit.

The couple, originally from Newcastleupon-Tyne, emigrated in 1979 to Brisbane, Australia, and are survived by two daughters and three grandchildren.

When the tsunami struck, Mr Clayton, a carpenter, went back into the water to try to save children after his wife scrambled to safety.

"It all happened so quickly." Patsy told the Evening Chronicle in Newcastle: "One minute the waters were calm, and the next minute he was getting sucked into the ocean. He was not only my husband but my best friend and was always by my side. I will miss him terribly."

Louise Willgrass (UK)

On herway to the beach, Louise Willgrass had just popped into a Thai supermarket to buy sun cream. Outside in the car, her husband, Nigel, 43, waited with her four children - Emily, 16, Ben, 14, Michael, nine, and Katie, six.

Louise, 43, was still in the shop when the wave struck their vehicle. Noel Willgrass and his children saved themselves by clinging on to debris. He then climbed on to a building to look for Louise, but could not find her. "The supermarket was full of water right to the top. I called for her and she wasn't there."

After searching frantically through the local hospitals he eventually found Louise's body. "There was a door on the right that said 'morgue'. I went in and there she was with many other people and it was just awful.

"I wanted to take herwedding ring and they wouldn't let me. There was nobody there forme." he said.