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Aidan Jones

Tourists in Chiang Mai have been warned to be alert for floods as waters spill over the banks of the Ping River, which bisects northern Thailand’s top visitor city.
The Mekong region has been contending with flash floods since Super Typhoon Yagi tore through northern Vietnam, Laos, and Myanmar earlier this month, killing hundreds of people in floods and landslides and destroying bridges, roads and houses.
Floodwaters from rivers swollen by fresh storms since Yagi have cascaded downstream to northern Thailand. Images shared on Facebook from Chiang Rai province have shown muddy torrents carrying cars and tractors through narrow hillside villages.
Waters are now rising in Chiang Mai, prompting tourist police to warn tourists “to stay alert for potential overflowing and flooding” in a statement posted on social media late on Wednesday in English and Chinese. Chiang Mai is the second most popular destination for Chinese tourists to Thailand.
Late Wednesday, Chiang Mai’s famous night bazaar was submerged by over a metre of water, forcing tourists to wade out of the area.
Neighbouring Lampung province is also still on alert for more flooding.
Further to the north, near the Laos and Myanmar border, the waters are receding in Chiang Rai. But they have left homeowners, hospitals and schools to clean up a thick muddy slurry that has slicked entire rural communities and Chiang Rai town centre, where the waters swept away riverside resorts and restaurants.

Relief agencies have called for support, while community groups are appealing for donations as the retreating waters leave destruction in their wake.
“I have never seen it like this before,” Pai Deetes, a Chiang Rai resident who works for NGO International Rivers, told This Week in Asia. “The floods receded after 48 hours but the water has left mud and devastation and the poorest people or those closest to the river cannot clear it up.”
Attributing the floods to climate change, she said increased urbanisation without proper planning or functioning warning systems had elevated the risks to people in the province.
“The only alerts came from posts on Facebook from ordinary people,” Deetes added.
Asia is the world’s most climate-vulnerable continent, with the frequency and intensity of typhoons, tropical storms and floods increasing due to the climate crisis.
Thailand’s floods are worsening each year, yet planning is falling far short of addressing the climate challenges ahead, experts say.
Many of the northern Thai waterways – including the Ping River- are tributaries to the Chao Praya which courses into central Thailand, then through Bangkok and empties into the Gulf of Thailand.

Bangkok, which is low-lying and sinking by a few centimetres each year, is vulnerable to serious floods. Authorities have so far been at pains to downplay the risks of a repeat of the 2011 floods, which submerged entire downtown districts of the Thai capital and killed hundreds of people.
But the long-term prognosis is bleak for a city which keeps on building despite its sinking status, especially as serious flood mitigation measures are yet to be implemented, including an expensive dyke or barrier at the Gulf of Thailand.
Experts anticipate parts of Bangkok will be routinely underwater by 2050 – if not earlier – as climate change brings rising seas and weather systems dump increasing amounts of rain on a city with limited, ageing drainage.
“Up until now the government has not put any policies in place or a master plan for the flood mitigation that is needed,” Seri Suparatit, a Thai climate expert on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), told This Week in Asia.
“Bangkok people are worried because once we start any project, it’ll still need around 20 years to complete.”


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Thailand

Thailand counts cost of climate crisis as tourists in Chiang Mai warned of flood risks

A street in the Chang Khlan area, Chiang Mai, which was flooded due to the Ping River overflowing into urban areas. Photo: dpa

Rescue workers searching for victims in flooded areas in Chiang Rai province, Thailand. Photo: AP

Thai Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra talking to flood victims during a visit to monitor the flood situation in Mae Sai district, Chiang Rai. Photo: EPA-EFE

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Immigration officers detain migrants who have overstayed their visas during a raid in Klang, Malaysia, on August 15. Photo: EPA-EFE

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People in Haiphong use ropes to remove fallen trees after Typhoon Yagi swept through Vietnam earlier this month. Photo: Reuters

This Week in Asia

Health & Environment

News

Asia

Southeast Asia

The country is still dealing with flash floods since Super Typhoon Yagi, which has killed hundreds of people across Southeast Asia


The country is still dealing with flash floods since Super Typhoon Yagi, which has killed hundreds of people across Southeast Asia.
