Article: A Test of Survival

It started simply enough, just a little shaking when Jeff Jones was drinking his morning tea. Probably a small earthquake, thought the former California

resident, nothing worth worrying about in the sunshine and crystal blue waters of Phi Phi Island.

Still, it roused the rest of the Jones clan — his wife, Mary Jane, daughter Sarah and sons Ben and Tim — and got them headed to breakfast before they went their separate ways.

Sarah, 25, sunbathing by the pool.

Ben, 23, back to the hotel room on the second floor.

Tim, 18, to an Internet cafe about a block away.

Mom and Dad off to shop.

Usually the Fairport family spent time in the water. Just the day before they had been windsurfing and snorkeling, enjoying time together in the warmth of coastal Thailand. Sarah, an English teacher in Bangkok, and the whole family had been looking forward to spending Christmas break together, using some of those frequent flier miles that Jeff, 55, accumulated from business travel as president and chief executive of a Rochester business consulting firm.

As they tell it, this day, Dec. 26, they had decided to take it easy in the morning, no big plans. Mary Jane bought a few souvenirs, including half a dozen colorful sarongs, and she and her husband settled in at a little cafe where they could still see the glistening water.

Soon the water started receding, as it does at low tide. Curious, thought Jeff, a sailor. It wasn't the right time of day for low tide. Service at the cafe seemed a little slow, said Mary Jane. No one had come to take their order.

Then water started surging toward shore, bringing small boats with it, and they knew they had to get to higher ground. Quickly.

Both started running, following the natives, but Mary Jane, 54, was lagging behind in her flip flops and skirt.

"Faster, M.J., faster," yelled Jeff, who could see a wall of water about 20 yards behind her.

Faster she went, all the way to higher ground where other vacationers and natives gathered. Two Thai women cried on Mary Jane's shoulders. A woman from Israel asked if she could stand with the Joneses. The

26-year-old stood between them, holding their hands and explaining that her husband had been cliff jumping. That's a good thing, they told her. He was

probably on high ground.

"Pray that God will show him the way," Mary Jane said.

Other people had lost bathing suits or had bleeding wounds, so Mary Jane, a registered nurse, offered sarongs as coverings and bandages and listened as mothers cried for missing children, husbands for wives.

The Joneses could see their hotel and the water surrounding it. Perhaps Ben and Tim, both strong and athletic, had found a way to escape. But what if Sarah hadn't seen it coming?

The first wave — full of glass, jagged metal and downed electrical lines — subsided, but the natives insisted that other waves were coming. It wasn't safe to search for survivors. Then there was a second wave, and a third.

"We're going," Jeff said. "We've got to find our kids."

Buildings had collapsed. Rubble was everywhere. But inch by inch the Joneses moved, pausing at one point to cover a body with a sarong. Always, they kept watch for possible places of refuge, such as staircases, in case there were more waves.

An hour passed. Then another. And finally they came close to their hotel.

"Dad!" came a familiar voice from a third-floor balcony.

Then a sigh of relief from the parents. Tim was OK.

But what about the others?

All fine and all together, came the answer.

Sarah had been standing by the pool and watched as people followed the receding water line. Moments later those people were engulfed in crashing waves. She ran for the hotel and heard Ben yelling from a second-floor balcony, "No, don't go into the lobby, come up these stairs."

Just as the water touched her feet, she reached the stairs.

Within minutes they realized they needed even higher ground and climbed to the third-floor balcony.

About the same time, water came rushing into the Internet cafe, a nearby hut. Tim and the owner climbed onto the roof but knew the hut would soon be washed away.

They jumped to the roof of an adjacent building that was close enough to a palm tree that two Thai men started to climb. The first man went to the top but the second didn't go much higher than the roof.

Tim tried everything, including makeshift sign language, to try to tell the man to climb higher, to make room for him on the tree. Nothing worked.

"I was waiting to die," Tim said. Huts were being washed away all around. But his stood until the water pulled away.

He joined Ben and Sarah at the hotel and the three prayed. After about an hour, Tim lost hope that his parents were alive. Sarah thought she had seen them from the balcony but Tim didn't quite believe it and went to look for himself.

After the family's reunion, Tim and Ben carried injured survivors to helicopters, rescue boats and for medical attention, using doors or boards or anything else they could find. Mary Jane dressed wounds, and Sarah and Jeff, who already had an injured shoulder from a car accident, sought to calm survivors.

"We weren't heroes or anything," Mary Jane said. "We're so lucky. It was a miracle."

Phi Phi (pronounced Pee-Pee) Island was a family-oriented place, Jeff said. Before the tsunami, laughter and children's voices could be heard almost

everywhere. Afterward, there was silence.

Everyone seemed to be looking for missing family members, and Tim said there even were moments when he felt a little guilty that his family had survived and was together.

Rumors swirled about other waves being sighted and airports being closed. It made it difficult for people helping the survivors and difficult to know what

information to believe.

As evening approached, rumors of the possibility of waves arose again, sending the family and others to the mountainous jungle on Phi Phi. The Joneses — including Jeff with his shoulder troubles and Sarah without shoes — climbed a 60-degree incline and found a flat place to stay for the night.

Ben used branches and leaves to fashion pillows. As they began to rest, a snake or perhaps a centipede of sorts bit Ben, causing pain that felt like a hundred bee stings. Natives wrapped the bite in a tourniquet and then did something with a cigarette, almost like they were trying to suck out any poison.

Sarah knew a few words in Thai, including the word for die. She asked whether her brother would die.

The natives laughed, and the Joneses took that as a good sign.

Within an hour, Ben saw improvement. And by morning light the family was headed down to shore and a rescue boat.

Many people were waiting anxiously to hear from the family. At JC Jones & Associates LLC, Jeff's firm, where Mary Jane works as an administrative assistant, the company was just a few hours from implementing a

succession plan when Jeff's call came through from Bangkok and the family's story of survival began to unfold.

"It really truly was a miracle," Mary Jane said at her Fairport home on Friday. She still doesn't quite believe it all happened.

"It hasn't hit us yet," she said between phone calls from people wanting to check on them. She, Jeff and Tim are home. Jeff is recuperating from his previously scheduled shoulder surgery and Tim has returned to classes at McQuaid Jesuit High School, where he's a senior.

Sarah remains in Bangkok for her teaching job and Ben is with her for a few weeks before he starts an internship with a film production company.

"There were so many people praying for us," said Mary Jane, who attends St. John of Rochester Church with her family. They should continue to pray for the thousands upon thousands who lost family and friends, she said.

If it had been any other day, Jeff said, the family would have been in the water. If Mary Jane had gone ahead and taken a walk, she would have been alone on the beach. "If we had made any other decisions, it

wouldn't be this way."

It really makes you wonder, he said.

"There must be something very important we need to do on this Earth."