Two Kanchanaburi dams ‘safe’ as water levels top 80 per cent
The directors of two major dams in the western province of Kanchanaburi insisted on Saturday that the dams remained safe and could take a lot more water, even though water levels had reached over 80 per cent of dam capacities.
Prasert Inthap, director of the Sri Nakharin Dam, said the reservoir held 15,338.54 million cubic metres of water or 86.44 per cent of its capacity.
On August 4 of last year, the water level behind the dam had reached 74.07 per cent of its capacity, 12.37 per cent lower than this year’s level.
On Friday, the water level behind the dam increased by 62.39 million cubic metres, still leaving room for another 2,406.46 million cubic metres of water.
Prasert said the Sri Nakharin Dam had been designed to international safety standards and received regular maintenance, and so is safe.
Waiwit Saengpanit, director of the Vajiralongkorn Dam, said the dam’s reservoir on Saturday had 7,410 million cubic metres, 84 per cent of its capacity.
He said the dam’s water-level management committee had decided to release 36 million cubic metres of water on Saturday, 39 million cubic metres on Sunday and another 43 million cubic metres from August 6 to 12.
Waiwit said the dam could hold an additional 1,450 million cubic metres. Given the recent heavy rains and an inflow of about 100 million cubic metres of water daily, the committee had decided to speed up the water release, he said.