AT noon on March 27, 2006, a small aircraft of Pelita Air landed smoothly at the Gunung Sitoli airport, Nias. The plane hired by the United Nations is normally used by humanitarian volunteers and NGO workers assisting post-tsunami-quake Aceh and Nias as well as by citizens in emergency conditions.

It was aboard the plane with a seating capacity of 40 that we traveled from Banda Aceh to Nias to observe the islands situation a year after an earthqu