Scores of children were among the dead when a 23-foot wall of water known as a tsunami hit the coast. Hundreds more were injured and were awaiting urgent medical help, while others were believed to have fled to higher ground in the interior, making accurate counts of how many perished in the disaster nearly impossible.

The tsunami hit without warning following an earthquake about 30 km off the coast in the Pacific Ocean. Fisherman Jerry Apuan said this morning that he was unable to count the number of bodies floating in a lagoon near one of the villages hardest hit by the wave.

``There were so many bodies together I had to move the boat slowly to pass through them,'' he said. ``I was afraid. It was the first time I had seen so manybodies.''

Papua New Guinea, with a population of 4 million, occupies the eastern half of the South Pacific island of New Guinea. It has a mountainous, jungle-filled interior that has only been explored in the past 20 to 30 years, along with lush tropical beaches on the coastal plains. The capital of Port Moresby is about 600 km east of the north-eastern tip of Australia.

``We heard a large bang, then saw the sea rising up. We had no choice but to run for our lives,'' Paul Saroya, a resident of Nimas village, told Australian Broadcasting Corp. Television.

Nimas was one of at least three villages swept away when a bank of three waves crashed into flimsy sea-front homes along a 35-km stretch of coastline in West Sepik province.

Australian government aid agency said officers in Papua New Guinea estimated the death toll would climb to more than 1,000, with many thousands injured, Australian defence minister Ian Mclachlan said.

Authorities at Aitape on the country's northwest coast said the tsunami hadwiped out three villages and had almost completely destroyed another.

``The latest death toll for the district is 599,'' district disaster coordinating chairman Dickson Dalle said. ``But the figure may increase as more bodies are found.''

Dalle said it was impossible to say how many people were missing. Most of the victims were old people and schoolchildren.

``Schools in Arop, Sissano and Warapu will be closed because we don't have the children,'' Dalle said. They're all dead.''