One man dropped to his knees and held up his clasped hands as if in prayer as the helicopter hovered just over his head. Another refugee strained against the blast of the rotor, his right hand reaching out.

Aboard the navy Sea Hawk, aircrewman Joseph Sabia Jr., 31, his eyes moist with sadness, scrambled to toss bottles of water down to them.

Relief workers say that people in this isolated region are dehydrated and on the brink of starvation one week after an earthquake and tidal wave killed tens of thousands, severed roads and left people completely isolated.

Helicopters from the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln flew a second day of sorties Sunday over the western coast of Indonesia's badly-hit Aceh province in an effort to bring relief to refugees whose communities have been wiped out.

Sabia's cramped Sea Hawk, piled to the roof with high-energy biscuits and water, found the first group stranded on a sandy berm surrounded by a small lake of reddish-brown mud filled with clumps of vegetation.

As they flew on, past empty beaches lapped by gentle waves, the destruction became even more evident.

Only the foundations of homes remained in some small coastal villages. Trees lay pasted flat to the ground and the water was sandy, as if it had eaten part of the shoreline.

The coastal town of Teunom looked from the air like a broken piece of white crockery -- the ruins of the town's buildings. The edges of a road were washed away, in other places it was blocked by trees, or completely severed.

Rice fields that surrounded the town lokked as if someone has dumped a load of muddy garbage in them. They were filled with corrugated metal, chunks of buildings, and other debris.

People walked or rode motorcycles past the few buildings that still stand.

About 40 villagers were waiting at the edge of a patch of dirt where the Squadron 47 Sea Hawks' pilots, Matt Chester, 27, and Ken Deppisch, 26, touched down.