Download from http://thainews.prd.go.th/newsenglish/previewnews2.php?news_id=378
Special Report for Andaman News NBT (VHF dial) + maybe FM90.5 Radio Thailand at 8.30am & perhaps relays/repeats on local Cable TV channel 1, broadcast to Phang Nga, Krabi & Phuket provinces, & possibly FM108 Mazz Radio 7.30pm in Phuket, Wednesday 9 July 2008 & http://thainews.prd.go.th/newsenglish/ Contact AndamanNews@yahoo.com
After informing people in advance about the full scale Tsunami Warning and Evacuation drill in 79 locations in 6 Andaman coastal provinces where the warning towers are installed, the Thai government on Monday July 7th conducted the exercise. They covered the provinces of Phuket, Phang-Nga, Krabi, Ranong, Trang and Satun.
In Phuket, participants involved included related officials, medical staff, communications, local governments, residents, and tourists, adults and children. It aimed at testing out the personnel, and equipment plus local residents' and tourists' awareness for handling future disasters in prevention of any loss of lives. The activity simulated an earthquake of 8.5 on the Richter scale and the National Disaster Warning Centre (NDWC) issued warnings via towers in all 79 locations. The towers are linked with the NDWC in NonthaBuri province, near Bangkok.
Once the warning tower signaled the alarms for a pretend Tsunami at around 9.45am, the exercise began. At Saphan Hin in Phuket city, after the siren, people and students who were in fact training for sports events, started to evacuate inland along the designated routes heading to higher and safer ground.
At the tourist beach of Patong in Phuket, some residents and tourists joined in the drill relocating themselves to safe ground after hearing the warning siren. They ran along the designated route of Soi Bang La onto Soi Sansabai lane which is designated as higher ground and an evacuation area.
The full-scale drill was run with search and rescue volunteers and medical teams to handle people who were supposedly injured from the tsunami or evacuation. They listened to the incident commander so that management would run as planned. The NDWC announced the end of the situation at around 10.20am.
After the drill the Deputy Prime Minister Suwit Khunkitti who witnessed the mock situation at Saphan Hin, in his capacity as chairman of the national committee on disaster warning systems, thanked local authorities, governments and all the public, and volunteers who contributed to the comprehensive exercise and voiced his confidence in the preparedness of locals in the case of any future natural disaster:
Similar natural disaster drills are expected to take place in northern Thailand, in preparation for potential earthquakes in that region.
Meanwhile Mr Suwit indicated that in future the warning towers will play the national anthem at 08.00 and 18.00 hours everyday to ensure that the systems are operating well.
After the drill we spoke to 3 sets of tourists in Patong, firstly to Australians who joined in the run up Soi Bangla to Soi Sansabai in the middle of town, and who just by chance were the same tourists we spoke to last week on the beach before the drill: According to them, the tower messages were not clear even though they were just 100 metres away:
Then we spoke to another Australian tourist who was staying at Sunset Beach Resort, in Kalim, in the north part of Patong, where another warning siren is installed right on top of the hotel. It is maintained by the Patong Municipality and according to the tourist it went off loud and clear at the same time as other towers on Monday morning:
Finally we spoke to a Dutch family of guests at Seaview hotel on the Beach road at the south end of Patong, where the Municipality also installed a warning siren on top of the hotel. However according to the tourist, the sound was not so clear as expected:
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Tsunami warning test day phuket, patong, thailandby BrownGhostDK4,343 views
Why would Western politicians learn Asian languages when the Asian ones are speaking with such good English?
AndrooUK 4 months ago
My full respect that a THAI politician speaks such good English. Every Thai school child learns English from grade 4, this is proof of why it is a good thing. How many Western politicians can speak Asian languages? Not many.
314noceu 3 years ago