A FATHER who clung on to a tree to escape a monster wave has told how he pulled bodies from the rubble after the disaster hit.

Roderick Walters, 37, was on holiday on the Thai holiday island of Phuket with his partner Sharon Wood, 34, and their three children when the tsunami struck their ocean-facing hut on Patong Beach.

Marine biologist Rod, of Parrock Avenue, Gravesend, tried to run for cover when the 30-foot wave engulfed the beach resort, but was hit by a massive swell that dragged him hundreds of yards into a tree.

He managed to climb to safety under breaking branches before realising he had only seconds to save the rest of his family-- including son Jake Walters, 13, and daughters Chelsea, 10, and Eloise, five.

As the wave withdrew he ran to the stilted hut, grabbed his family and piled them into an abandoned jeep which still had its keys in the ignition. He drove them to safety on high ground before returning to help others.

There he discovered washed-up bodies strewn across the devastated resort. Mangled wreckage surrounded him as he pulled screaming survivors and bodies free from the debris.

Mum Sandra Myatt only heard her loved ones were safe on Monday -- two days after the shattering earthquake. The 54-year-old, of Ebbsfleet Walk in Northfleet, had to take sleeping pills and was sick with worry for her family.

She said: "I heard about the disaster on the television. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. I couldn’t sit down and was walking around like a zombie crying and screaming.

“We just didn’t have a Christmas -- we didn’t know whether they were dead or alive. We just didn’t know anything."

Anxious brother Vic Walters of Burch Road, Northfleet, had desperately appealed for information about his sibling on two news internet sites. Rod was eventually able to call his mum at 9pm on Monday.

She said: "It was a fuzzy line but I cannot describe the relief at hearing his voice. He just kept saying: ‘It’s me mum, it’s Rod--we’re all fine.’"

The Walters family drove for two hours to reach a safe hotel. Unable to get an earlier flight, they will be returning home this Saturday.