Flooding submerges communities in South

FLOODING HAS continued to afflict several southern provinces, with floodwaters measuring more than two metres deep in many areas. 
In Songkhla’s Saba Yoi district, Ban Baeng village has been swamped for more than five days. As of yesterday, floodwaters were more than two metres deep. 
Saba Yoi is one of 16 districts declared disaster zones in Songkhla, where at least three flood-related deaths have been reported. 
Officials have also expressed worries about people being marooned by floods near Songkhla Lake. 
In some areas, floodwaters were so high that people were forced to use boats as their only mode of transport. 
Songkhla’s disaster prevention and mitigation department and the provincial irrigation office were using about 18 water pumps to drain water out of the heavily flooded Ranot district into the Gulf of Thailand. 
In Ban Noen Dhammang village in Nakhon Si Thammarat’s Chian Yai district, floodwaters rose to more than 1.5 metres yesterday. 
The situation was so serious that flood victims were dependent on officials for food and drinking water. 
Maj-General Arkom Pongprom, head of the 41st Military Circle, personally led a team delivering food to affected people in Ban Noeng Dhammang. 
Meanwhile, local irrigation officials said they were trying to drain floodwaters as quickly as possible because the ongoing monsoons could bring more downpours to the area. 
In the worst-hit areas of Nakhon Si Thammarat, floodwaters were about 2.5 metres deep. 
In Surat Thani’s Phra Saeng district, more than 300 houses in Ban Bang Yod village were swamped with floodwaters ranging between one and two metres deep, prompting some residents to evacuate. 
Soldiers and volunteers yesterday were delivering relief items to flood victims in the area. 
Medical workers were also prescribing medicine and distributing medical supplies while soldiers relocated bedbound patients to safe areas out of concern that floodwaters might rise. 
Many communities in low-lying areas on both sides of the Trang River in Trang province were flooded, with some houses nearly submerged, following the collapse of a river embankment in two places.
Among the hardest hit was Chulaphorn Ratchawithayalai Trang School near the Khlong Chang Bridge between tambons Bang Rak and Na To Ming. Many nearby houses were flooded with water reaching their rooftops.
People have moved their belongings by boat to main roads, where temporary shelters have been set up.
In Muang district, about 1,600 people have been evacuated from riverside areas.
In Narathiwat, seven tambons in Muang district, home to 8,042 households and 32,000 people, were also experiencing heavy floods.
The Meteorological Centre for the South’s eastern coast announced at 6.30am yesterday that rain would continue in Surat Thani, Nakhon Si Thammarat, Phatthalung, Songkhla, Pattani, Yala and Narathiwat during the next 24 hours as a result of a northeastern monsoon covering the Gulf of Thailand and the South.