Six months later, despite repeated and ongoing searches, the hotel group says it may never be entirely sure that every corpse has been recovered from the sprawling site, a two-hour drive north of Phuket island on Thailand's Andaman coast.

Nothing is left of the spa, the beachside bar, the open-air restaurant or the disco that faced the sea at Sofitel Magic Lagoon Resort, once among Khao Lak's most beautiful hotels.

All that remains are the lobby, a restaurant, and three floors of rooms that were perpendicular to the sea and managed to hold on.

"You see the brown lines here," said Stephane Del Prete, head of Accor China's human resources, as he walked through the second-floor rooms during a weeks-long assignment to Khao Lak.

"The water rose up to here, about 30 centimeters (12 inches) below the ceiling."

Four deadly waves crashed across the coastal plains around Khao Lak, which offered no resistance as the tsunami swept through, snatching tourists from their breakfast tables and washing some of their bodies up into the ceiling's crawl space.

Thai police found another victim here just last month, when the skeletal remains of a Frenchwoman were discovered May 17 under the hotel's foundations. Authorities managed to identify her because she still had on her jewelry.

None have been found since, even though some relatives of the 151 guests who died or went missing believe their remains may still be on the hotel grounds.

Some family members have accused the hotel of not doing enough to find the bodies of their loved ones.

"We can never be completely sure that every corpse has been found," said Patrick Basset, head of Accor's operations in Southeast Asia.

"Some bodies were washed out to sea, others could be in the forest," he said. Behind the hotel, in the coconut grove that isn't hotel property, "enormous trees were uprooted, sand was piled up. We can never be 100 percent sure".

"But everything is being done to maximise the chance of finding the bodies," he said.

In January and February, search teams pored over the hotel grounds: Thai teams, French firefighters and police, German police and a Greek team scoured the property.

In April and May, Thai authorities returned for two more detailed searches, which is how the latest corpse was discovered.

"Since then, no more bodies have been found," said Basset.

This month firefighters, specially trained sniffer dogs, French military teams and Thai police all failed to find any evidence of further human remains.

Crawl spaces beneath the buildings were searched twice more, while dogs sniffed through the coconut grove, he said.

Mountains of debris were sorted to reassure families worried that bodies might lie underneath, he said, and the dogs then made another search.

Search teams face a difficult mission, combing across a site of eight hectares (20 acres), searching beneath buildings in crawl spaces only 50 centimeters (20 inches) high, just enough room for someone to slide across and search by hand.

Then there's the sheer power of the tsunami and its devastation.

"The body of one Khao Lak resident was believed to have been found 80 kilometers (50 miles) from here," said Del Prete. Search teams have found 220 bodies at the Sofitel, which had only 205 guests and employees listed as dead or missing.

As the search continues, Accor has tried to quiet a debate with "just a few" bereaved families about their efforts.

Hotel officials are on-site on a rotational basis to assist in the event that mourning relatives or inquisitive journalists visit the deserted site.

The future of the hotel, which was just upgraded December 13 from a four-star Novotel to a five-star Sofitel, remains uncertain.

The owner of the property, a German of Turkish descent, has yet to decide whether to rebuild.

Then, Accor must also answer several questions: Is it possible to remain at a location that suffered such a tragedy? Will tourists return? Will they have the heart to swim at Khao Lak?

And if Bangkok wants to restore Khao Lak's glory as a tourist destination, a path chosen just a few years ago that brought 40 five-star hotels, can a hotel giant like Accor afford to stay on the sidelines?

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