113 dead as Pacific quake, tsunami, flatten villages

TOWERING tsunamis churned up by a huge earthquake slammed into the Samoan iland and the United States led with immediate pledges of assistance, scores more people were missing feared dead in the chaos and despair that the twin disaster left in its wake.

"We are getting reports of missing people in areas where damage is extensive on the south and southeast coasts," local journalist Jona Tuiletufuga said. "Entire villages have been wiped out."

Up to 70 villages stood in the way of the waves in the worst-hit area and each housed from 300-800 people, Tuiletufuga said.

Nine members of one family were killed in the village of Lalomanu on the south-east of Samoa, a relative said.

"My family own the Taufua Beach Fales and we have confirmation that nine members of our family have perished, four of them children and many more missing," the bereaved relative told Australia's public broadcaster.

"The tourists haven't been accounted for either."

Amateur video footage showed villages that had been completely obliterated, homes reduced to shards of metal and wood, while cars were stuck in treetops where they had been hurled by the force of the tsunami.

Samoa's deputy prime minister Misa Telefoni said his tiny country's tourism hotspot was "devastated" by the tsunami which left residents and holidaymakers with little time to flee.

"We've heard that most of the resorts are totally devastated on that side of the island. We've had a pretty grim picture painted of all that coast," he said.

Two of the country's most popular resorts, Sinalei Reef Resort and Coconuts Beach Resort, off the west coast of the main island of Upolu, had been hit hard, he told AAP.

Australia said at least two of its citizens, including a six-year-old girl, were dead while Seoul said two Koreans were also killed. One person from New Zealand was also feared dead.

Apia, capital of the independent state of Samoa and nearly 3,000km from Auckland in New Zealand, was evacuated as officials scrambled to get thousands of residents to higher ground.

Officials in American Samoa, about 100km from Samoa, said the death toll of 22 was expected to climb.

"It could take a week or so before we know the full extent," Michael Sala, Homeland Security director in American Samoa, said.

Waves around 25 feet high did most of the damage as they swept ashore about 20 minutes after the earthquake