Thread: The politics behind Thailand's floods

Originally Posted by Gerbil

^^ Did that gibberish make sense to *anyone*?

Does he ever?

Why don't you go and live in 1-2 metres of stinking, dirty floodwater for a month+ with no end in sight and report back to us about how you feel about it.

Phoney, self-righteous indignation don't advance your nuetral PADite arguments.

Originally Posted by Calgary

Why don't you go and live in 1-2 metres of stinking, dirty floodwater for a month+ with no end in sight and report back to us about how you feel about it.

Phoney, self-righteous indignation don't advance your nuetral PADite arguments.

It is REALITY, something you appear to be very far removed from.

Originally Posted by StrontiumDog

Except that they are also filing suits against the Bangkok Governor...

Tit for Tat.

The Democrat Party instigating suits against Government disaster management in order to advance their agenda of transferring disaster related victimization to victimization of Govt.

Fight fire with fire.

Originally Posted by StrontiumDog

Originally Posted by Calgary

Why don't you go and live in 1-2 metres of stinking, dirty floodwater for a month+ with no end in sight and report back to us about how you feel about it.

Phoney, self-righteous indignation don't advance your nuetral PADite arguments.

It is REALITY, something you appear to be very far removed from.

Phoney, self-righteous indignation doesn't advance your nuetral PADite arguments

^ My god, you are absolutely freakin' nuts.

what is this PAD stuff in all your posts? People have been trapped for over a month now, do you really want to help them, or simply publicise your political ideals?

One other thing you should know as well. You are still nothing but a farung to your constituancy. That is a fact.

Originally Posted by aging one

People have been trapped for over a month now, do you really want to help them

I've done my best, at considerable expense and personal effort.

And enjoyed doing it.

Originally Posted by Calgary

I meet many VIP politicians in my social circles, and they don't pay the least bit of attention to this Farang.

why not drop a few names as well? 555

Originally Posted by aging one

Originally Posted by Calgary

I meet many VIP politicians in my social circles, and they don't pay the least bit of attention to this Farang.

why not drop a few names as well? 555

Sorry, not my style.

do you take your schizophrenic pills in public and in front of your Thai friends ?

do they tell you in Thai you do not understand that "you forgot again to shake your medicine this morning"

they must be laughing at you,

I find Calgary's arrogance astonishing.

He genuinely seems to think that his posts are of great value, what a chode.

And I agree BF, I suspect his red-shirt friends are laughing at him

Am I the only one that's reminded of Charlie 'winning' Sheen when reading Calgary's ramblings?

Originally Posted by aging one

what is this PAD stuff in all your posts? People have been trapped for over a month now, do you really want to help them, or simply publicise your political ideals?

One other thing you should know as well. You are still nothing but a farung to your constituancy. That is a fact.

^judging by his recent messages about 3 days a month helping and the remainder holler than thou preaching.

The flooded homes in bangkok must have lost the lost its novelty to the press, rather like Ayutthaya and its issues. Out all the people I know who have been flooded, only one has a home is now free of flood water. Not that they can get to it or even start assessing what they need to do to make it habitable. So its effectitivly almost as bad as it was last week and the week before. Its not surprising that people are getting less tolerant and accepting.

off topic, anyone know any decent health and safety shops in bangkok. I think I am going to run out of my stash of hazchem disposable suits, and the ones I have are too big for most thai's? I know there's one in fortune city, but its a bit limited.

Originally Posted by Moonraker

Am I the only one that's reminded of Charlie 'winning' Sheen when reading Calgary's ramblings?

good one!! I was thinking more along the lines of Hitler or Mussolini. But you have me hands down with the Sheen reference.

Tiger blood.

Originally Posted by hazz

At the end of the day. I have used raw data that shows that the these two dams for most of the last 7 years were managed in such a way that would have allowed them to hold almost all of the main soon rain that entered them.

You still haven't worked out that this year was different to the last 7 years. You say you have used the raw data but you have not presented of the water levels below the dams which would have allowed them to release water earlier.

While my wifes rice farms are in another water storage basin we have just planted our 5th (yes 5th) crop for this year. The other 4 were flooded out by the rain earlier in the year starting about March. There was only a very small period of time in which we could drain the water off the land to try again. Looking at the rainfall for our area it was not a standout and was very similar to lower North and Central areas. If the dams around us had opened their gates earlier in the year then we would have been worrying about far more then just rice.

Did Calgary actually say that those living in stinking, 1- 2m high water, were to blame themselves?

Apart from personal attacks on him I don't see anything controversial in what he writes.

He comments on the message of the Rangsit students' video, free speech? Ain't it?

Originally Posted by Calgary

And of absolutely no consequence. What we think about Thai politics doesn't amount to "a Hill of beans". I meet many VIP politicians in my social circles, and they don't pay the least bit of attention to this Farang. Other than perhaps a bit of a novelty in that circumstance. But that is the lot of us political junkies here in Thailand.

In contrast to Western countries where the wishes of immigrants actually figure in the scheme of things - especially once their own become members of the political system. We see Thailand with a succession of Chinese PMs - how long before we get a long nose in the job?

Originally Posted by DroversDog

You still haven't worked out that this year was different to the last 7 years.

If had looked, you would have seen there are many parallels between 2011 and 2006. which in its self is rather worrying given the 5 year gap.

Originally Posted by DroversDog

You say you have used the raw data but you have not presented of the water levels below the dams which would have allowed them to release water earlier.

If I had said the dams should have been managed in a different way, you would have a point. But I have been careful not to say this; you are not reading what I am saying.

What I have said is that if the dams had been managed as they have in the majority years. then the dams would have been able to retain the almost all of the monsoon rain flowing though them this year and this water represented a very significant fraction of the water flooding central thailand.

The decision to fill the dams with wet season or monsoon season rain is a decision ultimately made by the minister of agriculture. this decision will have been based on political, technical and economic considerations. He had a choice of actions and he chose to retain wet season rain and compromise monsoon flood mitigation. This may well have been the right decision for thailand as a whole, but we do not know because he is not explaining the reasoning behind this decision. I have not commented on this beyond the need to consider the interests of thailand as a whole when making this decision. My guess is that he's hoping that enough people buy into the 'act of god' and 'beyond government control' theories and nobody bothers to ask hime to explain what happened.

As I said, the numbers are available and if you think that I am wrong about the contributions the dams could have made to mitigating this years monsoon floods, please free to demonstrate your analysis.

He's not happy is he?

Taksin finds out Cowboy will be flooded - YouTube

Originally Posted by hazz

Originally Posted by DroversDog

You still haven't worked out that this year was different to the last 7 years.

If had looked, you would have seen there are many parallels between 2011 and 2006. which in its self is rather worrying given the 5 year gap.

These figures suggest that there is not any parallels with 2006 with the exception of Chiang Mai which will feeds into Bhumipol Dam.

Only looking at dam data I can see where you are basing you views from.

Originally Posted by hazz

Originally Posted by DroversDog

You say you have used the raw data but you have not presented of the water levels below the dams which would have allowed them to release water earlier.

If I had said the dams should have been managed in a different way, you would have a point. But I have been careful not to say this; you are not reading what I am saying.

What I have said is that if the dams had been managed as they have in the majority years. then the dams would have been able to retain the almost all of the monsoon rain flowing though them this year and this water represented a very significant fraction of the water flooding central thailand.

If there was not an exceptional amount of water already in the system, then they could have let more water out earlier. This year with the spread and the amount of rainfall their options was limited.

Originally Posted by hazz

The decision to fill the dams with wet season or monsoon season rain is a decision ultimately made by the minister of agriculture. this decision will have been based on political, technical and economic considerations. He had a choice of actions and he chose to retain wet season rain and compromise monsoon flood mitigation. This may well have been the right decision for thailand as a whole, but we do not know because he is not explaining the reasoning behind this decision.

Is this not clear?

Suthep Noipairoj, head of the Irrigation Department’s Office of Hydrology and Water Management, said discharges from the dams were reduced starting in April because some agriculture lands downstream were already flooded.


“The dams are full because the rainfall in the northern part of the country reached a new record high this year,” he said by phone. “It’s not true that we reduced the water released because we were concerned about water shortages. The people who said this just want to find a scapegoat.”

[quote=droversdog]
These figures suggest that there is not any parallels with 2006 with the exception of Chiang Mai which will feeds into Bhumipol Dam.
[quote]
drovers dog, we are discussing the dams and their status during the year. That is where there are parallels. lets stay focused. after all when discussing the effectiveness of the dams its the water coming in and out the dam itself thats the issue.

As we have moved away from whether or not the dams could have mitigated the monsoon season flooding this year to discussing reasons why it was necessary to retain water in the wet season. Do you accept that the dams can be managed so that they can mitigate the monsoon season floods? even ones as serious as this year.

This beings us to your point that the wet season water was retained to stop wet season flooding.

I don't have any issue with the idea that mitigating wet season flooding is a priority over the mitigation of monsoon season flooding. The management of water levels in the dams over the last 7 years supports this idea. But this does come at a risk and in 2006 and 2011 thailand lost the bet and the dams could not absorb the wet and monsoon season waters and far more serious flooding occurred during the monsoon season.

If preventing monsoon flooding had been given priority these dams could have mitigated much of the flooding we are suffering now by retaining a large percentage of the water caused the monsoon season flooding in central thailand, at the cost of flooding in the wet season.

the choosing between these options is the political decision that the MoA has to make. It really comes down to the effects of the less extensive wet season flooding, which presumably can devastate the rice crop, is more important to the thai economy than the effects of the far more serious monsoon flooding which have seriously compromised thailands industrial base and many international JIT supply chains, this year.

Bit of a hobson's choice, I am not sure which is more important. I am not sure the MoA knows either; which is why it would be nice to find out the reasoning behind the changes to dam management policy.

Going forward. As the dams appear capable of mitigating these very heavy monsoon season floods, when they have not been compromised by wet season water retention. One way forward to prevent history repeating its self, would be to upgrade the drainage infrastructure in central thailand so that its capable of preventing damaging floods during the wet season, without the need to reduce water outputs from the dams.

Originally Posted by hazz

Originally Posted by droversdog

These figures suggest that there is not any parallels with 2006 with the exception of Chiang Mai which will feeds into Bhumipol Dam.

drovers dog, we are discussing the dams and their status during the year. That is where there are parallels. lets stay focused. after all when discussing the effectiveness of the dams its the water coming in and out the dam itself thats the issue.

Their effectiveness only works up to the point of their live capacity. The conditions this year exceeded their capacity. This is totally expected and is hardly the fault of either of the 2 governments.

Originally Posted by hazz

As we have moved away from whether or not the dams could have mitigated the monsoon season flooding this year to discussing reasons why it was necessary to retain water in the wet season. Do you accept that the dams can be managed so that they can mitigate the monsoon season floods? even ones as serious as this year.

Just in case you missed this

Suthep Noipairoj, head of the Irrigation Department’s Office of Hydrology and Water Management, said discharges from the dams were reduced starting in April because some agriculture lands downstream were already flooded.

“The dams are full because the rainfall in the northern part of the country reached a new record high this year,” he said by phone. “It’s not true that we reduced the water released because we were concerned about water shortages. The people who said this just want to find a scapegoat.”

Originally Posted by hazz

I don't have any issue with the idea that mitigating wet season flooding is a priority over the mitigation of monsoon season flooding. The management of water levels in the dams over the last 7 years supports this idea. But this does come at a risk and in 2006 and 2011 thailand lost the bet and the dams could not absorb the wet and monsoon season waters and far more serious flooding occurred during the monsoon season.

Yes they lost the bet as have many other countries.
If they had released water earlier they would have made the flooding at the time much more severe. If the rain after July was at the average rainfall levels then they would have caused large amount of flooding for no reason. Better planning and not building factories and housing estates on flood plains would be better then trying to make dams do what they are not designed to do.