forcebwithu

Update on the Beach Rd drainage project. Concrete drain forms in place and ready for use on the north end. Breaking up the existing pavement is now up to Soi 2. And digging commences at Soi 3. They've tied the trees to each other to keep the ones closest to the road from toppling over due to soil erosion. This is odd. Where's the connecting drain south of Soi 6. Gutters and pavement being poured just north of Klang intersection. Turned my camera to sea and what do I see. Only two parasailers in the air this morning. South of Klang, drain covers going in. Around Soi 8, gutter work is pretty much done. With the exception of a few places where drain access points are being worked on. Boardwalk across from Mike's Mall is looking very rough and on its last legs. South of Soi 12, only the curbs need to be installed. New curbs installed up to Royal Garden Plaza. If it were me, I would have installed curbs at least twice as high to keep more of the storm water from flowing onto the footpath. At the south end, work still needs to be done to connect to the pumping station. Anyone need a used IV bag. Quite the garbage pit on the south end. No way would I want to step on this access lid.

I put in another 1,000L tank about six weeks ago to collect rainwater to be used for watering the garden. In the early morning hours today was the first time I got to test the system. Collected about 150L from the brief downpour. Not bad considering how quickly the storm passed through Pattaya.

They may not even be aware of when the water is cut to their place if they have a large enough tank. Same at my house. The tank that gets filled from the city supply is underground and has a 2m x 2m, heavy metal access lid over the top. I decided last week to prop the lid open so I could periodically check when city water was flowing into the tank. It was only then that I could tell the water was cut during the day, but turned back on in the evening.

Think that's why we've seen a drop from 6 MCM to 4 MCM per week consumption. Even at the lower consumption rate it doesn't bode well. The only PWA announcement I've read as to water conservation efforts is a reduction in water pressure. But I now know for a fact they're also turning off the water during the day as that is what has been happening at my house, and others in our neighborhood for at least a week. I see that as a good thing, but I wish they would have announced they were doing that so we could plan to limit our day time use. My guess as to why they haven't, don't want to scare off the tourists that things aren't looking so rosey with the water situation.

Same here, but don't carry a credit card, too much of a hassle to replace if lost or stolen. Instead carry two bank ATM cards. The bank accounts have a sufficient balance, along with my insurance card, to get the hospital to admit me in the event of an emergency.

The Eastern Water Resources dept has finally gotten around to updating their Weekly Water Situation reports for February 7th & 14th. Consumption has slowed from 6 million cubic meters (MCM)/week to about 4 MCM/week. Storage volume as of 14 Feb was 67.5 MCM. Subtracting the minimum storage volume of 31.7 MCM leaves about 36 MCM of usable water, or about a 9 week supply at current consumption levels. That will get us to 17 April, far short of June that a recent PWA news report would have us believe.

Had a nice ride out to Huai Chak Nok Reservoir today. The water situation is looking pretty dire there too. Google Earth view of the photo stops today. I've also noted the change in the water's edge since the last update on 28 December. Pic 1 Pic 2 For comparison, pic from 28 December Pic 3: Workers taking advantage of the low water levels to dig a channel into the shallow part of the reservoir. Should help in future draughts as they won't have to set up pumps to get the water from the shallow areas into the main body of water. Pic 4 Pic 5 Pic 6: Interesting erosion lines and rock structures in the exposed lakebed. Pic 7 Final pic is looking at the south end of the reservoir on the other side of the road.

If you have respiratory issues, by all means mask up with the PM2.5 masks. If you're otherwise healthy, the AQI levels we're seeing in Pattaya are upwards of 150 and at that level you'll notice a haze in the air, but I've not noticed any congestion issues from the pollution. And I'm out on long bicycle rides for exercise most days. For virus protection you'll need N95 masks, but even wearing one of them won't give you much protection. For the best virus protection you'll have to walk around with a face shield or goggles to keep the virus from entering your system via your eyes. If you're not a healthcare worker, the best protection from viruses is frequent hand washing. The video in @BeerBelly's post below has a very good description of the proper protocol to follow for handwashing. The entire video is worth watching, but the handwashing part starts near the end at the 12:00 mark.

That's a classy addition the Nirun market is getting. Even has walls between the shops.

Speaking of grubbing around for change, I get annoyed when I'm held up at the checkout counter by a lady that insists on digging around, searching the bottom of her purse, to find that last one baht coin so she can pay the exact amount due.

On Sukhumvit they've started work on pulling electric lines through the new underground conduits.

Today's update on the shrinking Mabprachan Reservoir. As before, here's the Google Earth view of today's route and picture taking spots. Pic 01: Not much movement, if any of the shoreline from the last update 12 days ago. Pic 02: However definitely more land that was previously underwater is now exposed. Pic 04 They now have a pump ready to pupmp water over a land bridge so the pumping station farther north has access to what's left of the main body of trapped water. Guessing the water level is down another 1/2 meter from 12 days ago. Pic 05: Won't be long before that spit of land in the distance becomes a land bridge all the way across the north end of the reservoir. On the left side of the pic you can see how the main body of water is now cutoff from the channel that leads to the pump station by another land bridge heading to the north. I don't know why they don't get an excavator in and cut a channel through rather than pumping the water over. Pic 06: Since the channel into the pumping station is now on higher ground than the main body of water to the south, they had to build a retaining wall and now have to pump the water into the pond. The gate was unlocked so had a peak at the pumps in the pumping station. Pic 07 Pic 08 Pic 09: A few puddles of water left on the north end, but no way to get it to the pumping station. Pic 10 Pic 11 Pic 12 Pic 13 Pic 14: If I had wanted to, I could have rode my mtn bike from this side of the reservoir over to the other side using the land bridge in the center of this pic. Pic 15: Instead I rode out the spit of land a bit farther south. View to the north while standing on land that was underwater 12 days ago. For comparison, pic 19 in the screenshot below was how far I could ride my bike out on 28 January. Pic 16: The intake water line for the retention pond on the southwest corner of the reservoir is really having to extend out to get to the main body of water now. Pic 17: I was told by someone that lives in the area this retention pond and pump house is used to supply water to the new Flowerland tourist trap. Probably in another month or so all the tourists will see for their entrance fee is a bunch of wilted flowers.

Here you go.

source: https://www.weather-th.com/en/thailand/pattaya-climate

The weekly water situation report as of 31 January has been posted on the EW site (link). In the week since their last update the reservoirs are down about 6 million cubic meters. Assuming the trend is linear that means we have about seven weeks before we hit the minimum storage volume of 31 MCM.

At the new Nirun market, someone finally got smart and realized they'd better have a way to open the sides for cross ventilation. And on the other side work continues on the market addition.

More internet sleuthing led me to an article in the Bangkok Post from 2014 that made for interesting reading. Running taps a pipe dream in Pattaya And from that article... "Mr Wanchai said East Water only delivers raw water to treatment plants run by the PWA in Pattaya. At that point, the company’s responsibility ends, and it is up to the PWA to take care of the infrastructure which processes the raw water and delivers it to people’s homes." "Pattaya water is sourced from five different natural reservoirs, while the PWA also has the contract to buy raw water from East Water in case water from the reservoirs is not enough to meet demand. Mr Wanchai from East Water explained that Chon Buri usually suffers more shortages than neighbouring Rayong province since the water reservoir in the area is small and unable to feed the whole town at the same time." Looking at the the East Water website I found this image of the water grid. Keep in mind this grid doesn't show the infrastructure PWA uses to source water from the reservoirs under their control. Even more interesting was the Water Volume of a Reservoir that shows the current storage volume as of 20 January. Not looking good for us. There's also another page called the Weekly Water Situation. Even though it says weekly, the last report was as of 17 January. Lots of pretty graphs in the situation report. The one that caught my eye was this one that lists water volume as of the 17th at 88.29 Million Cubic Meters (MCM). If I'm reading the chart correctly the target for this month was 240 MCM, but at 88 MCM that puts us in the Severe Water Shortage Warning band.

Did a bit of internet sleuthing and found this document with a list of reservoirs and their users. Turns out there are nine that provide water to Pattaya. Wish I could task a satellite for real time imagery, but as I'm retired CIA I guess I'll have to do it the old fashion way with feet on the ground to get pics of the current water levels.

The ever expanding Nirun market as of this morning.

Seventeen days since the last update so time for another shrinking Mabprachan Reservoir update. Here's the Google Earth overview of the route this morning with markers where the pictures were taken (Satellite image Nov 5, 2018). Pic 1 Pic 2 Pic 3 Down another .5m since 11 January. Pic 4: The lake now supports two modes of transportation. Pic 5 Pic 6: I think we'll soon be able to see just how deep the channel is to the pumping station. Pic 7: What remains in this pocket of water is too small for the big blue pump. They're now using a smaller pump just on the other side of the big pump. Pic 8: As it turns out I didn't need to use the rickety log bridge. There was a land bridge on the other side of the pump in the above picture that allowed me to ride my mtn bike to the other side. Pic 9: All that's left of the lake in parts is a marsh. Pic 10 Pic 11: The lake has receded enough so I could ride my mtn bike across the lake bed to the other side. Pic 12: The fishing camp is now high and dry. For comparison, the fishing camp on 11 November, view is from the other side of the camp in the above picture. Pic 13: Last time the water was this low was September, 2015. That year it was only one month until the start of the rainy season. This year we're eight months from any appreciable amount of rain. Same view from September, 2015. Pic 14 Pic 15 Pic 16 Pic 17 Pic 18: This is the view of the current northern edge of the main body of water left in the reservoir. Pic 19 Pic 20: Let's see how far out I can get on the bike. Pic 21: The ground is a bit soft and mushy in spots, but still rideable. Pic 22: Made it to the other side. Pic 23: Not much water left to pump into the retaining pond on the edge of the reservoir. At the current rate of water consumption, my guess is we have at most two months of water left in the reservoir. The Chonburi government really needs to act now to protect what little remains of the main water supply for Pattaya, and pigs may fly.

Not Trump, but Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-01-12/mnuchin-says-boeing-woes-could-lop-a-half-point-from-u-s-gdp

Le Pub is now sporting a new sign on Walking Street.

Good point. While not the lowest point in the area, anything on the floor is going to get soaked from flooding after any major downpour.

The new Nirun market has a new structure going up. Looks like another first class, Thai quality concrete pad. The other structure has been stocked with household goods. Best to bring a hydration pack when shopping though as it only opens on the front side, so it's going to be bloody hot in there.

Looks like a DeLorean to me, although it appears the rear thrusters got photoshopped out of the pic for some reason..