The UN World Food Programme (WFP) said on Tuesday it was sending 31 tons of food to assist some 2,000 people in Somalia's northern Hafuni island, which was battered by surging waves spawned by the mammoth earthquake off Indonesia.
"The food is going by road - the journey takes six hours in low tide [and] there is a land bridge to the island. They should be reaching any time," WFP said in a statement released in Nairobi.
At least 40 fishermen were confirmed dead and more than 60 others were still missing after their wooden fishing dhows capsized on Sunday in the wake of killer waves off the east African coast.
The WFP, which operates an air service in Somalia, said it would carry out an aerial assessment over Somalia's battered shoreline on Thursday.
It has stored about 1,000 tons of food in the Somali northeastern state of Puntland, which were initially destined for drought victims, but can be used to aid those affected by the tsunami, the statement added.
The world's biggest-ever aid operation got under way on Tuesday to help countries across the Indian Ocean stricken by the quake and the resulting tsunamis.
Death toll exceeds 60,000
The confirmed number of people killed in the massive earthquake and tidal waves that struck Indian Ocean shorelines at the weekend exceeded 60,000 on Wednesday, amid warnings the true toll could be far higher.
In Indonesia an official from the social affairs ministry said the country's toll had risen to 30,057 after it took the full force of Sunday's huge earthquake and tidal waves that swallowed entire coastal villages.
In Sri Lanka 17,800 people, including at least 70 foreigners, were killed by the tidal waves.
The death toll in India crossed 9,000 with many thousands still missing, officials said.
It includes 4,000 in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, close to the epicentre of the Indonesian earthquake that produced the tsunamis, and another 4,500 in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu.
More than 1,500 people, among them more than 700 foreign tourists, were killed in southern Thailand, officials said. They feared that most of around 1,500 people still missing were foreign tourists.
In Myanmar at least 90 people were killed, according to the UN, while 65 people were dead in Malaysia, officials said.
At least 55 people including two British holidaymakers were killed in the tourist paradise of the Maldives while another 69 were missing, officials said.
In Bangladesh a father and child were killed after a tourist boat capsized in large waves, officials said.
Fatalities also occurred on the east coast of Africa where 100 fishermen were declared dead in Somalia, 10 in Tanzania and one in Kenya.
The US Geological Survey said the earthquake west of the Indonesian island of Sumatra measured 9.0 on the Richter scale - making it the largest quake worldwide in four decades.
Death toll to date
Indonesia: 31,600
Sri Lanka: 17,800
India: 9,450
Thailand: 1,570
Myanmar: 90
Malaysia: 75
Maldives: 60
Bangladesh: 2
Somalia 40
Tanzania 10
Kenya 1
WFP starts sending food aid to Somali tsunami victims
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