Tsunami carnage only now becoming clear

Tsunami surges killed hundreds and devastated ports and towns along the Chilean coast in the first hours after Saturday's 8.8 magnitude earthquake. The USC students at Neon Tommy have pulled together a good roundup, and also grabbed this NOAA / Center for Tsunami Research animation of how the energy is believed to have spread through the day across the entire Pacific Ocean.

AP has this passage from the village of Dichato:

Teenagers drinking on the beach were the first to shout the warning when they saw a horseshoe-shaped bay empty about an hour after the quake. They ran through the streets, screaming. Police joined them, using megaphones.

The water rose steadily, surging above the second floors of homes and lifting them off their foundations. Cars were stacked three high in the streets. Miles inland along a river valley, cows munched Monday next to marooned boats, refrigerators, sofas and other debris.

Also: Mexico City journalist Daniel Hernandez blogs from Buenos Aires on his quest (mentioned in today's Morning Buzz) to get in to Chile and do some reporting for the Los Angeles Times. [Correction: Hernandez is not a freelancer; he's a new local hire by the LAT bureau in Mexico City.]