Boxing Day tsunami tribute in Canberra brings closure

More than a decade after the Boxing Day tsunami, a memorial was unveiled in the nation’s capital yesterday.

Joseph Giardina and his daughter Carla at a memorial to those lost in the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami unveiled today in Kings Park on the shores of Canberra's Lake Burley Griffin.

Looking across the calm water of Canberra’s Lake Burley Griffin on a blue-sky summer day, Joseph Giardina finally feels he has ­closure.

More than a decade after he lost his 16-year-old son Paul in the Boxing Day tsunami, a concrete memorial in the shape of a wave was unveiled in Kings Park, in the nation’s capital, yesterday.

After a long campaign by Mr Giardina to have a place to remember the 26 Australians who died in one of the most horrific natural disasters, the families of those victims had a chance to meet — many for the first time — and remember their loved ones.

“This is the closure,” Mr Giardina told The Australian. “This is where you’re able now to put your grief to rest, if you like, in this memorial.

“There was a huge void. There was no place that one could go to reflect or anything that indicated that such an event had taken place … We’ve now got a place where we can come to collectively. A memorial like this will preserve their memory and that’s important.”

About 230,000 people were killed by the 2004 tsunami that struck Indonesia, Sri Lanka, India and Thailand following a 9.1 magnitude earthquake.

Mr Giardina was on holiday in Phuket and eating breakfast with his wife Evanna and Paul — his daughter Carla was not on the trip — when the first wave struck at about 10am. The three managed to get about 10m into their hotel before the water hit and threw them over a wall.

Mr Giardina grabbed Paul, who had Down syndrome, by the collar but could not hold him when he landed in the water and something hit him on the head, causing him to black out. The Melbourne property developer doesn’t know how he survived.

Paul’s body was found three days later in a makeshift morgue.

Yesterday Malcolm Turnbull praised Mr Giardina’s leadership in developing the memorial and congratulated its designer Darryl Cowie.

“It is understated. It’s tranquil and a very deliberate contrast to the destructive, heartbreaking violence­ of Boxing Day 2004,” the Prime Minister said at the unveiling. “To the survivors and those who lost loved ones, I know you have carried the burden of being the national memory of this incredibly cruel and sad event.”

Bill Shorten said the tragedy had such an impact on the country’s psyche because Australians knew they or their loved ones could easily have been victims.