Bangkok’s waiting game
Thai prime minister Yingluck Shinawatra has insisted that Bangkok’s main airport, Suvarnabhumi, will not be flooded by the torrent of water now threatening the city.
But the PM said it would be hard to fend off all the floodwater from Bangkok.
The Thai capital’s second airport, Don Muang, has already been shut down due to flooding.
“What we’re doing today is to try to delay [flood water] so it will not burst into Bangkok to the point where people have no time to prepare,” she said.
The prime minister said in the worst-case scenario all of Bangkok would flood, but with different areas experiencing water levels between 10 centimetres to more than a metre.
If three key flood barriers hold up, damage will be limited, officials say.
About 400 million cubic metres of floodwater are now in an area north of Bangkok and poised to flow in.
“Bangkok’s water-drainage capacity is just 30 million cubic metres a day,” an official said.
One news report indicated that builders of fibre-glass boats are struggling to keep up with demand, producing 2000 boats a day to sell to Bangkok residents looking to escape the floods.
Ian Jarrett
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