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death toll tops 22,000

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YANGON, Myanmar (CNN) -- A Myanmar government radio station said Tuesday that more than 22,000 people are dead and 41,000 missing after the catastrophic cyclone that battered the country.

A news broadcast on the state-run station said Tuesday that 22,464 people had been confirmed dead from Cyclone Nargis. The broadcast added that 41,000 more were missing.

The U.N. estimated up to a million could be homeless.

China's state-run Xinhua news agency, quoting officials, reported a death toll of 10,000 alone in the township of Bogalay.

CNN's Dan Rivers, the only western journalist in Bogalay, said he had seen nothing but destroyed homes for 30 kilometers and people were now sheltering under canvas covers. They had little food bar a small amount of eggs and rice.

Rivers said he had seen the army and Red Cross in the area, but the weather remained awful and conditions were miserable.

The aftermath has pushed Myanmar's normally secretive ruling military junta to ask for aid and release details of the devastation. However, the U.N. said its aid workers were still waiting for visas to enter the country. It, the Red Cross and other aid organizations have been gathering supplies to ship to the country.

U.S. President George Bush Tuesday called on the military junta to allow it to help with disaster assistance.

Bush, who made the comments while signing legislation awarding the Congressional Gold Medal to Myanmar democracy advocate Aung San Suu Kyi, said the U.S. was ready to "come and help."

"The United States has made an initial aid contribution, but we want to do a lot more," Bush said.

"We are prepared to move U.S. Navy assets to help find those who have lost their lives, to help find the missing, and help stabilize the situation. But in order to do so, the military Junta must allow our disaster assessment teams into the country."

The U.S. Navy is making preparations to respond to any requests for assistance, U.S. military officials told CNN. The Navy has calculated it would take its nearest ships four days sailing time to get to the affected area.

Maung Maung Swe, Myanmar's social welfare minister, earlier told reporters that the country needed aid now, The Associated Press reported.

"Instead of waiting for figures on casualties and damage, it will be practical to send humanitarian aid to victims as soon as possible," Swe said.

He revealed that that 95 percent of the homes in Bogalay -- a city of 190,000 -- had been destroyed, AFP reported.

"Many people were killed in a 12-foot tidal wave," Swe said.

The U.N. World Food Program (WFP), which was preparing to fly in food supplies, offered a grim assessment of the destruction: up to a million people possibly homeless, some villages almost totally destroyed and vast rice-growing areas wiped out, AP reported.

"We hope to fly in more assistance within the next 48 hours," WFP spokesman Paul Risley said from Bangkok. "The challenge will be getting to the affected areas with road blockages everywhere."

Based on a satellite map made available by the U.N., the storm's damage was concentrated over about a 30,000 square-kilometer area along the Andaman Sea and Gulf of Martaban coastlines, which is home to nearly a quarter of Myanmar's 57 million people.

Kyi Minn, of the international aid group World Vision, told CNN that the situation was bleak.

"It could be worse than [the] tsunami," Minn said, comparing the cyclone's impact on Myanmar to the damage caused following the tsunami that struck the region in late 2004. The tsunami was triggered by a a massive earthquake off the coast of Indonesia and killed more than 150,000 across the region.

Minn said clean drinking water, food, medicine and shelter were all at a premium.

Shari Villarosa, the top U.S. diplomat in Myanmar, told CNN that urgent help was needed.

"The situation is very bad and not getting better," said Villarosa

Villarosa said many in the international community wanted to help but were still waiting for the Myanmar government to grant their relief teams visa.

Nargis pummeled Yangon for more than 10 hours from Friday night into Saturday, with 20 inches of rain and winds above 240 km/hr.

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