For days, rough seas and bad weather have hampered relief operations, leaving residents to fend for themselves. With not enough people to dig graves, corpses littered beaches and roads, according to district chief, Edison Salelo Baja. Fisherman were scouring waters in search of survivors.
"The number of dead is now 282 and 411 are missing," West Sumatra provincial disaster management official Ade Edward told Reuters by phone.
The fault line that ruptured Monday on Sumatra island's coast also caused the 2004 quake and monster Indian Ocean tsunami that killed 230,000 people in a dozen countries.
Disaster officials were still trying to reach more than a dozen villages on the hardest hit Mentawai islands — a popular surfer's destination that is usually reachable only by a 12-hour boat ride.
But they were preparing for the worst Wednesday, with hundreds of body bags being sent to the scene, said Mujiharto, who heads the Health Ministry's crisis center.
Fault lines
President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, meanwhile, cut short a state visit to Vietnam to deal with two major disasters that struck Indonesian in less than 24 hours. The country's most volatile volcano, Mount Merapi, 800 miles to the east, erupted at dusk Tuesday, sending up searing ash clouds and killing at least 28 people, including an elderly man, Mbah Maridjan, who was considered the mountain's spiritual gate-keeper. Mbah Maridjan was believed by many Javanese to possess magical powers.
The two events were not related, but they both fell along Indonesia's portion of the so-called Pacific Ring of Fire, a series of fault lines that are prone to earthquakes and volcanic activity stretching from the Western Hemisphere through Japan and Southeast Asia.
"I want to make sure the emergency response has been running well," Yudhoyono, a former four-star general, told reporters in Hanoi. "I want to see for myself the condition of the victims."
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Authorities have been trying to evacuate more than 11,000 villagers living on the slopes of the volcano, where many houses have been destroyed, the ruins lying covered in white ash.
Kresno Heru Nugroho, head spokesman for Yogyakarta's Sardjito hospital, said 28 people had been killed by bursts of hot air released by the volcano late on Tuesday. His colleague, Endita Sri Andrianti, said some people were burned beyond recognition.
At least 25 killed as Indonesian volcano erupts Sumatra tsunami kills over 100, hundreds missing Indonesia's explosive geology explained NBC: Naked men try to calm a volcano Eight dangerous volcanoes around the world'Quite calm'
"We are still collecting details to identify them. Most of them were burned to death," she told Reuters by phone, adding that 14 villagers had suffered burn injuries.
The country' top volcanologist, Surono, said Merapi was now "quite calm."
Video: Volcano eruption in Indonesia kills at least 18"There are no signs of another imminent eruption but I cannot guarantee anything and we don't know if this is just a temporary rest," Surono, who like many Indonesians only has one name, said.
However, Metro TV showed footage of some villagers returning home on Wednesday.
The 7.7-magnitude quake that sparked the tsunami struck late Monday about 13 miles beneath the ocean floor was followed by at least 14 aftershocks, the largest measuring 6.2.
Harmensyah, who heads the West Sumatra provincial disaster management center, said the number of people killed in the tsunami had climbed to 154 and more than 400 others were missing.
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"Finally we have a break in the weather," he said, adding that he hoped search and rescue operations would finally pick up pace. "We have a chance now to look for the missing from the sky and also to survey the extent of the damage."
Officials say hundreds of wooden and bamboo homes were washed away on the island of Pagai, with water flooding crops and roads up to 600 yards inland. In Muntei Baru, a village on Silabu island, 80 percent of the houses were badly damaged.
Those and other islets hit were part of the Mentawai island chain, 175 miles from Sumatra.
Eight Australian survivors, and American and a New Zealander arrived in the Sumatran city of Padang on Wednesday, recounting their harrowing encounter with the tsunami.
They said they were on the back deck of their anchored boat, the 'MV Midas,' when the wall of water smashed them into a neighboring vessel, triggering a fire that quickly ripped through their cabin.
"They hit us directly in the side of the boat, piercing a fuel tank," said Daniel North, the American crew member. "Almost immediately, the captain gave the order to abandon ship and everyone got off the boat."
'Deeply saddened'
They clung to surfboards, fenders — anything that floated — as they washed in the wetlands and then climbed the highest trees they could find and waited for more than 90 minutes until they felt safe.
Ade Edward, a disaster management agency official, said crews from a tourist boat were found safe after more than 24 hours missing in the Indian Ocean, including up to nine foreigners.
President Barack Obama, who spent some of his childhood in Indonesia, said he was "deeply saddened by the loss of life, injuries and damage" caused by the quake and tsunami.
"At the same time, I am heartened and encouraged by the remarkable resiliency of the Indonesian people," Obama added. "As a friend of Indonesia, the United States stands ready to help in any way."
The Associated Press, Reuters, NBC News and msnbc.com staff contributed to this report.
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