Besides killing more than 600 people in Sri Lanka's eastern port of Trincomalee, the tsunami raided the city on Sunday also hit the local tourism industry very seriously.

With its beautiful beach and hospitable residents, Trincomalee is one of Sri Lanka's most attractive tourism spot. However, the tsunami destroyed a lot of beautiful hotels in the region and it will take a long time for local tourism industry to recover.

In Nilaveli region of Trincomalee, the 30-year-old Nilaveli Beach Hotel was totally destroyed by the tsunami. All the 86 guestrooms were inundated on Sunday and nearly half of the villa-style buildings collapsed.

Neville Paul, manager of the hotel said Tuesday that nine people died on Sunday in the hotel due to the tsunami. "One of thedeceased was a restaurant staff member and eight of them were guest of the hotel," Paul said.

Broken bed legs, chairs, tables, soaked mattress are still scattering around the yard of the once beautiful hotel. A new car is squeezed between two coconut trees with some part of its head buried into the earth.

"Most of the damaged vehicles belong to the tourists who come to the beach to play," said Paul. "Then left their vehicles here and didn't come back," he added.

The manager said he is negotiating with insurance company for the payment of the damage. "But it's hard to estimate the scale ofthe loss," he said.

Waltern Kell, a security guard of the hotel shows Xinhua the mark of the water line on the wall. He also asked Xinhua to take aphoto for him in front of the security quarters of the hotel wherehe has been working many years.

"I will leave the hotel very soon. I don't know when can I comeback," Kell said after asking Xinhua to print a picture for him asa memory of his working days in the hotel.

Local residents said many of the local hotels have a same fate as that of Nilaveli Beach Hotel. This is testified by the difficulty in finding a habitable hotel in Trincomalee.