Flooding in Thailand, October 2011

Flooding in Thailand, October 2011

Bangkok is being threatened more and more, by the minute almost. Many people have been evacuated and some people leave the city of their own account for safer and drier shores. Can't blame them. Some are just stuck in their homes.

Floods are nothing new to Bangkok, this is the Democracy Monument in 1942

Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra on Friday issued a disaster warning for Bangkok, consolidating power for flood control and drainage.

Yingluck invoked the 2007 Disaster Prevention and Mitigation Act to oversee flood control in lieu of declaring a state of emergency. New parts of the city are being submerged, little by little.

The overall situation is rather depressing around of and North of Bangkok. Press releases mention that around 350 did already due to the floods in Thailand.

A sign today in Tesco Lotus in Chaweng

Consumer goods are getting sparse in the South of Thailand and Koh Samui is no exception, although the damage is still seemingly small, a visit to Tesco Lotus (see the sign above) and Makro this afternoon, saw still relatively well stocked shelves but certain goods were sold out and will not be replaced soon, due to lack of supply. There's seemed to be still plenty of bottled water available, but no big 1.5 liter bottles and only certain brands were available. We went on a little bit of a shopping spree ourselves and bought drinking water, more things to drink (green tea) and lots of instant noodles.

Creative thinking finds solutions, a picture that made its rounds today on the various social media in Thailand

This weekend is going to be crucial and will show if Bangkok will escape major flooding. As of right now, Suvarnabhumi airport is open and operating a usual.

Right now I can only hope that things don't get worse and the situation will get back to 'normal ' as soon as possible, although reports indicate that this will take at least a month in the flooded areas and for the industrial areas, before everything is cleaned, fixed or replaced and up and running again, it may well be a couple of months.

Camille