alanmorison

WITH the year half over, newly released TAT figures for the 2008 high season reflect a drop in numbers that indicates leaner times ahead. Resorts and the Phuket economy are likely to suffer as the price of oil pushes up the cost of flying.

Thai and overseas visitors staying in Phuket resorts and guesthouses in the first three months of the year totalled 784,831. This compares with 945,327 in the same period of 2007 and 901,322 in 2006, and amounts to a drop of 15.92 percent.

-- Reaction and details at www.phuketwan.com

A LARGE entertainment venue capable of holding up to 2000 people is under construction in Phuket City, with a boutique brewery providing the venue with a name.

The Phuket Brewery is set to open at the Tesco-Lotus intersection, opposite the supermarket. Thai rock icon Carabao has already been booked for the first show, on November 21.

The developers of the venue made their name in milk.

-- More at www.phuketwan.com

Invest in bicycle shares and learn to ride one today. That seems the best advice for people on Phuket as love and business suffer because of rising gas prices. Inflation may not be far behind

LARGE-SCALE social changes are occurring on Phuket, with police in Kathu even turning to electric motorbikes as the cost of gas bites hard at budgets.

''We only have so much to spend and it doesn't take account of higher costs,'' said the chief of Kathu police, Police Colonel Grissak Songmoonnark.

His officers oversee Patong, the island's largest tourist town, and reputedly the one with the most crime.

The seven battery-charged electric motorcycles, a gift from generous local businesspeople, are being used to patrol Kathu day and night.

Colonel Grissak would like a few more. Meanwhile, the expensive to run vehicles are being left at the station.

Similar changes are happening in private life as everybody is forced to cope with gas prices that have risen to 36.59 a litre for octane 91 petrol at stations and 37.39 for the octane 95 variety.

Diesel at 42.09 is even more expensive, with a version known as B5plus finding sudden popularity because it is a little less costly.

In all aspects of life on Phuket, fuel prices are causing remarkable changes, especially in society and business.

Security guards at Central Festival report that numbers of vehicles in the carpark have fallen away dramatically as people either don't go shopping as much or join friends in one car instead of travelling alone.

Families who own motorcycles and have acquired a small car or a pickup as they grow more wealthy are now moving back to the motorcycles out of necessity, even on wet days.

Relationships are being shaken, companies are being stirred. Love is being thwarted, too.

Phuketwan has been told by the amorous driver of one four-door pickup that he is now looking for a motorcycle to deliver better value than his Honda Click.

He usually dates women four days a week, taking them to restaurants. For now, his love life is in ruins because he cannot afford to go out more than once a week.

And the date may not be impressed because these days he takes his female friends to simpler, less costly restaurants.

A man with eight trucks in a transport business told Phuketwan he was cutting back to just three trucks. And he would sell those, too, if he could. Petrol is simply too expensive for him to make the business profitable.

- More details at www.phuketwan.com

The region's low cost accommodation leader is reportedly set to open on Phuket. If it's a Tune, you may not be able to hum it but you could grow to like the sound of saving money.

INTERNATIONAL resort brands continue to make their debut on Phuket, whether as shiny five-star villa units or as lower-cost accommodation.

Now comes a new surprise: Look out for a Tune.

On June 20 the Malaysian group, Tune, announced a large new low-cost resort locally.

At the ceremony, founder and director Tony Fernandes had this to say: ''The group aims to have 100 hotels up and running within three years and these would include sites outside Malaysia, such as Kuta and Legian in Bali, as well as locations in the Philippines and Thailand.''

Chief executive officer Mark Lancaster told The Star Online: ''In Thailand, there will be a Tune Hotels.com each in Bangkok, Pattaya and possibly in the next week or so in Phuket.''

So . . . we are on the lookout for a Tune, the brand that offers no-frills space including a comfortable bed and bathroom, but leaves the customer free to supply or buy the rest.

Bring your own towel, or buy one. Room rates are incredibly low-priced.

The first Tune in Kuala Lumpur bears strikingly bright red and white colours.

Fernandes is the man who pioneered Air Asia, so the Tune idea definitely has wings.

The likelihood is that the Phuket Tune would work best near the airport, a big bus terminal, or in Patong.

While Phuket continues to target high-end visitors, package tours and charter flights are growing in numbers too, bringing more and more travellers across the whole spectrum.

- Complete report at www.phuketwan.com

That is the thing with natural disasters, they always happen at the most inconvenient of times and seldom give any warning. What happens if the next tsunami occurs in 50 years time when virtually nobody remembers the last one and nobody knows what that flashing red light and siren on a pole is for?

Actually the 2004 tsunami gave plenty of warning. For a start, it was measured as an undersea earthquake of exceptional magnitude. It's just that nobody warned the people of the Indian Ocean rim, although there was plenty of time to do so. The fact that the wave hit the Andaman Coast on a Sunday morning was convenient to the extent that there was no school. And in daylight, more people were up and about and able to escape. I am more concerned about a potential tsunami tomorrow and the next day rather than in 50 years. You should be, too.

More than three years after the tsunami, it is not possible for any resident or visitor to Phuket or any other coastal province to feel as though they are adequately protected.

Only two Andaman resorts have signed up so far to provide the comprehensive but costly warning service on offer from the National Disaster Warning Centre.

The beach warning tower system that stretches along the coast is imperfect but probably adequate, combined with television and radio, during daylight hours.

But the question that needs to be asked repeatedly is this: what happens if a second tsunami comes at 3am, everybody is asleep, and the radios and television sets have been switched off for hours?

The most appropriate lesson comes from Hawaii, where half a century ago one tsunami was followed by a second, 14 years later.

Dr Smith of the NDWC believes the onus should be on all Andaman resorts to be able to tell tourists that they are adequately protected by a relatively sound 24-hour tsunami warning system.

-- Full report at www.phuketwan.com

Rice. Computers. Cement. Motorcycle taxi rides. Chillis. A hot shower. A small chicken. A haircut. A ladies' shirt. A tooth extraction. Shampoo.

THE PRICE of rice has surged alarmingly on Phuket along with the price of a motorcycle taxi ride and the cost of a bag of cement.

But inflation is being contained on the island so far, says the Department of Trade.

A spokeswoman in the department's Phuket office reports that Grade A rice has shot up from 135 baht for a five kilo bag to 217.25 baht between January and May.

Rice is one of 250 items and services checked each month on the island by department inspectors who track price rises and demand explanations where they are excessive.

While cars, pickups and motorcycles are the same price in May as in January, the cost of transport appears to be rising rapidly. So, it seems, is the cost of an education.

Motorcycle taxis are much more expensive, rising from 40 baht for a three kilometre trip in January to 55 baht in May.

Construction is also likely to be considerably more costly today. A bag of cement that cost 129.50 baht in January rose to 138 baht in May.

-- The other items and services that are costing more . . . go to www.phuketwan.com

The Phuket Gateway proved to be an expensive project that the island did not need. Now the new Orborjor president has decided to do something practical: ask local residents what they want to do with it.

Newly-elected president of the Orborjor, Paiboon Upatising, has told local leaders that he wants to find a practical use for the wasted development.

The local leaders have now begun asking Mai Khao residents for ideas to put the ostentatious project to better use.

''The time has come for leaders to stop giving people projects they do not want,'' Khun Paiboon said.

Phuket Gateway sits close to the Thepkrasattri Bridge that carries vehicles from the mainland to Phuket.

The Gateway was intended to be a stopping place where visitors could learn a little about the island's character, culture and history.

But nearly everyone rushes straight on past to their hotel or resort. The carpark seldom has a vehicle in it.

Constructed in the time of his predecessor, Anchalee Vanich Tephabutra, and opened as part of the 80th birthday celebrations for the King, Phuket Gateway turned out to raise more questions than it answered.

The biggest question: why was it built in the first place?

-- Complete report at www.phuketwan.com

First you see them, now you don't. The police reinforcements coming to safeguard tourists and residents on Phuket on Phuket are staying put now. The long arm of the law just got shorter.

THE CRISIS over the low number of police on Phuket is set to continue because of a backflip on the plan to shift the Royal Thai Police command headquarters from Surat Thani.

Relocating the command, with its complement of more than 300 police, was seen as an efficient way to improve the protection of tourists and island residents.

Phuket's leaders unanimously list security as the island's most important priority.

But Lt. Gen. Tanee Tawitsri, Chief of Provincial Police Region 8, told Phuketwan on June 3 that the command headquarters would stay in Surat Thani.

''Surat Thani is more at the centre of the seven provinces in the region we have to cover. Phuket is over to the west and a long way from some places,'' he said.

''Geographically, it makes sense to keep the command where it is now.''

The latest sign that police are being stretched beyond common sense comes in the Rawai-Nai Harn region, the Phuket region where late-night muggings have been causing concern.

Saman Chainarong, chief of Chalong police, said that burglars were so brazen now that they were stealing all of the furniture in homes vacated by people returning to Europe for the summer.

''We don't have enough police in this area or any area on Phuket,'' he said.

--complete report at www.phuketwan.com

A stylish motor yacht for charter, along with cute cars for hire. Twinpalms is certainly evolving. And there may even be a second Twinpalms resort coming soon. Where? On Cape Yamu.

TWO OF Phuket's best-known names, Twinpalms and Cape Yamu, are likely to be united in a deal that will probably put a new version of the iconic resort on the island's most stylish headland fairly soon.

It's a betrothal between brands that is more than just talk. Land has been cleared at the cape for a new resort, based on the successful Twinpalms Phuket at Surin beach.

A little more candlelight canoodling is required first, even though the property owner and the resort's Scandanavian backers are said to share a desire to start another Twinpalms.

An insider told Phuketwan that the deal was ''more than 50 percent certain'' to go ahead within the next two years.

That's fascinating to hear, yet fresh surprises at Twinpalms are usually the stuff of local legend. The small resort (the word ''boutique'' tends to be overused) enters yet another new phase in its brief but impressive life from June 5.

On that day, the MY Olympia sails from Taiwan for Phuket waters. The sleek white power cruiser also has a second name, Twinpalms One.

At 76 feet it will be probably the longest, largest and most luxurious vessel on charter duty around the island. The yacht, operating under a fractional ownership arrangement, will offer impressive daily cruises out of Yacht Haven from July 9.

As the name implies, if the idea proves to be a winner, Twinpalms Two could be setting sail before too long.

The number three also has its place, though. Twinpalms car rentals are coming soon, with three small white vehicles, covered in large red kisses, set to take to the island's streets.

-- full report at www.phuketwan.com

A Superman suit and a decompression chamber help a Phuket plane crash victim to recover. But Robert Borland still wants the answer to one important question: why?

Borland survived last year's plane crash on Phuket and, almost as remarkably, he survived the 99 days in hospital that followed.

The hefty company CEO was dragged onto a wing and into the arms of rescuers by a humble Thai hero who turned back into the burning plane to carry out the rescue.

Borland's long battle with serious gasoline burns to 30 percent of his body followed.

And then there were the demons he had to confront before flying again.

''I've learned that life could finish pretty quickly at any time, so my philosophy has changed a bit,'' he said over a coffee in Patong, the resort town where he lives.

Borland, a 10-year Phuket resident who was born in Britain before migrating to Australia, is one of 40 people who survived the crash of One-Two-Go flight 269 at Phuket International Airport on September 16 last year.

Ninety passengers and crew perished in the smouldering fuselage or succumbed later to wounds.

Here's what the survivor had to say about his first flight months after the crash, a short hop to Bangkok, with his burns still healing: ''The landing was the traumatic part. I did my best not to look out the window, to concentrate on a point on the bulkhead in front of me.

''But you're aware of all the 'clunks' as the wheels start going down. You hear 'clunk' as they put the airbrakes on and you hear another 'clunk' as something else happens.

''You tend to tense up, no matter how much you try to say to yourself: 'You're ok, they're a very good airline, excellent aircraft, you're in a nice safe seat, the staff are looking after you, the captain has been properly trained, don't worry about these things.

'''But you are still thinking 'I know things can go wrong.' You say, 'OK, five minutes, four minutes, three minutes . . . You feel the wheels touch the ground and you think, 'Yup, I'm OK.' Then you get the hel_l off the plane.''

- read the full report at www.phuketwan.com

A HASTILY-CALLED meeting to discuss the 63.5 billion baht Ao Phuket project brought angry responses from local leaders today.

They were irate about two things: the lack of warning about the meeting, which was brought forward a day at the last minute, and the 2200 rai project itself.

Ao Phuket would involve building a 37 billion baht conference centre on reclaimed land off Phuket City's Saphan Hin public park, with a 26.5 billion deep-water marina.

The project, first mooted in 1989, has a long and troubled history. The original proposal by the Orborjor was part of a plan to give economic autonomy to the whole province of Phuket.

The ''independent Phuket'' part of the plan has vanished.

Critics today say Ao Phuket on its own would be a waste of money because large amounts of public land are available elsewhere, much closer to the Phuket International Airport.

The meeting saw plenty of critics in action against a few defenders of the project.

Worasit Rojanapanit, director of the key Designated Areas for Sustainable Tourism Administration (DASTA), told about 100 people at the Phuket Merlin Hotel in Phuket City that the process of listening to local opinion had just begun.

But one woman in the audience responded that if everyone in Phuket had known about the meeting, many more would have turned up and asked awkward questions.

Locals needed much more information about the project, she said.

People connected with the environment certainly needed to be told what was happening, but so did students, farmers, teachers, monks, fisherfolk and officer workers - in fact, all Phuket residents.

Bringing international visitors to Phuket was something everyone wanted but local needs and the environment were also important, said Chalong community leader Suta Pratep Na Talang.

He said he did not believe the project offered sufficient benefits to locals.

Others spoke out against the destruction of Saphan Hin as a public park and a sports centre that thousands of locals also used for festivals and picnics all year round.

A construction period of several years, coupled with the building of new roads, would bring an end to the park and its benefits.

The Ao Phuket project, on the other hand, would only be used by conference centre visitors and rich yacht owners.

Khun Worasit promised that he and other members of DASTA would return to Phuket frequently to explain the project thoroughly and listen to what local people had to say.

Some people questioned why he would come back when the message from the meeting was one of overwhelming opposition to the project.

--More reports at www.phuketwan.com

METHEE Tanmanatragul, the outspoken president of the Thai Hotels Association Southern Chapter, has two word for the simple poaching process applied by some Phuket resorts: manpower stealing.

He also says that he doesn't think Thailand is ready for the five-day working week.

''Even Japan, in the top five in the world in terms of productivity and gdp, doesn't have a five-day working week.

''They still go with six days a week. I think the real method for overcoming this human resources shortage should be focussed on demand and supply.''

But Khun Methee fears a malaise within Thai society is damaging the career futures of a generation of Thais. ''There should be a national campaign,'' he said, ''asking young people: 'Do you want a career, or a degree?'

''They would rather follow fads or fashions instead of having a focus.''

--Full report at www.phuketwan.com

MANY people on Phuket say that the island is a long way short of being overdeveloped. There is space for more resorts, condos and villas.

What they argue may be true, if the sole measure of development is the amount of concrete covering what were once green, natural areas or plantations.

Bear in mind, though, the permanent changes that have already been wrought.

Patong Bay was once home to turtles and dolphins. Did the resort town become overdeveloped on the day when the last turtles and dolphins swam away?

The island's leading holiday centre should be an appropriate example when decision-makers contemplate whether they want unrestricted development, or a balance between construction and nature.

But a balance means placing a limit on construction.

Like Patong, Phuket is, to many people, not yet completely developed. But how will we know when that point is reached?

-- Full report at www.phuketwan.com

MOST of the survivors of the container truck tragedy in which 54 people suffocated on the road to Phuket are due to be sent home to Burma today.

Some will face fresh tragedy from Cyclone Nargis.

Phuketwan understands that many of the 66 Burmese survivors, who have been held first in jail then a detention centre since April 9, come from villages severely damaged by the ferocious cyclone that has killed more than 60,000 people.

Most of them will be going back to Burma without knowing whether their families and friends are alive or dead.

Ten survivors are being held by authorities in Ranong, a busy port on the border with Burma, pending the trial of six people charged over the nightmare ride

Those being held are two women, four men and four children, three girls, two aged 17 and one 13, and one boy aged 15.

-- full report at www.phuketwan.com

PLANS FOR a two-billion baht underpass through Patong Hill have suffered a major setback with Patong Tessaban opting on May 14 to reject the budget for a feasability study.

The head of the Tessaban board, Raksak Nuset, said the 39 million baht underpass study was too expensive to undertake now and there was a danger that the underpass itself could damage the environment.

-- full report on www.phuketwan.com

PHUKET may seem to be thriving but one key economic indicator is the local pawn shop. Record amounts are being handed over for hocked items as parents pay for children going back to school.

The word from the local pawn shops is that there are signs of a slowing economy on the island.

According to Pataranut Woramid, manager of the tessaban-backed Pawnshop Phuket in Phuket City, an extra 50 million baht more than normal is to be loaned in April and May this year, most of it to anxious parents.

Up to five million baht a day changes hands.

In April and May 2007, a total of 13,540 people pawned items at the government store alone and took away 146,627,400 baht.

Khun Pataranut said this year, more people were coming than last year, an indication that the island's economy was not flourishing as many people claim it is.

Gold necklets and rings, mobile telephones, DVD players, television sets, watches and computers are the items most people hock when they need quick money.

full report at www.phuketwan.com

Alan, unless you are a reporter, talk from your heart, don't spark the concern yourself. Did you see the fight? Or was it second hand testimony. I think it is biased to say that Aussies are in fact cheap tourists and are the ones causing trouble. IMHO, you are causing more trouble than they are.

Yes, I am a reporter (see phuketwan.com)and therefore heartless. But that means I am also licenced by trade to use the word 'sparks' to ignite your interest. I am also an Australian and totally ashamed by the behavior of these wandering thugs. Let them break up their own homes, at home in Sydney.

Binge drinking and brawling by Australians creates an atmosphere of menace that scares other tourists and points to a growing problem associated with cheap package visitors.

A WILD, fist-swinging brawl involving a group of Australians holidaying in Patong has raised concern that cheap package tours are bringing the wrong kind of tourists to Phuket.

The brawl involved between four and six burly men who could not be controlled by local Thai security staff, and who apparently enjoyed fighting each other.

Three Thais were king-hit by the Australians as they fought each other. The bannister of a staircase and large decorative pots were wrecked during the fighting.

The ''battle of Patong'' took place in the early hours of Anzac Day, a solemn holiday when Australians and New Zealanders remember those who have fought and died in world wars, Korea, Vietnam and other combat zones.

-- read the full report at phuketwan.com

ONLY leaders as black-hearted as the generals who rule Burma could manage, through callous selfishness, to turn a large natural disaster into a catastrophe of mind-boggling proportions.

Today, hungry, homeless Burmese are being asked to go to the polls to vote Yes on No in a tricked-up constitutional referendum.

This faux piece of theatre marks the end of the bleakest week yet in a country where, to many, every week must seem worse than the previous one.

Just seven days ago, Cyclone Nagis began carving a swathe through Burma's rice-growing heartland, generating four-metre waves and devastation on a scale that has not been endured since the tsunami.

In the days since, speculation about the ultimate death toll has leapt, as it did in the aftermath of the tsunami, from large numbers to the figure now being quoted by the United Nations: 100,000 dead.

The Sun and the Daily Telegraph newspapers in Britain, where competitive idiocy is inclined to gazump sensible reporting, are now saying that the toll could reach 500,000.

Indeed, if the generals continue to behave with such disdain for the survival of the populace, that speculation may not in the end seem entirely absurd.

Having failed to warn Burma that the cyclone was coming, the generals are now intent on doing what they do best: saving their own necks.

Even if the people rise up off their knees today to vote No, we know how the result will be portrayed.

This is a country where the junta has a stranglehold on the polling stations and a free media remains choked in the mud.

It will be a referendum vote based on the lessons learned from Mao, Josef Stalin and that modern-day dictator, Robert Mugabe.

The pain of the people will continue to be ignored, just as the Guide Book for Monsters says it must be.

What kind of leaders would stop the world sending aid to people in torment, hundreds of thousands who are now facing hunger and starvation?

The kind of leaders who shoot and torture monks, who build their own capital city in a safer place, and who continue to be tolerated by too many leaders of other nations who should know better.

Thailand's reaction to the tsunami of December 2004 was a model of swift action, compassion and common-sense that other nations could only admire.

It sprang from a caring society where every member of every community has a value (and in adulthood, a real vote.)

Burma may also be essentially Buddhist, but its leaders are bad to the core. The greed for greater riches and a lust to stay in power are what drives the generals.

While Thailand tolerates people of all races and religions, Burma denies citizenship to those who dare to be different and practices ethnic cleansing by driving them from their homeland.

Yet today's pain will kindle tomorrow's anger, as never before.

By refusing to accept international standards of aid and decency to save their own people, the generals are shortening their own lifespans as leaders.

As painful as the agony of Burma is to watch, it's certain now that the winds of change are coming, albeit at a terrible, terrible cost.

QUESTIONS ARE finally being asked in public about the effectiveness of the Andaman coast tsunami warning system.

More than three years after the tsunami, it is not possible for any resident or visitor to Phuket or any other coastal province to feel as though they are adequately protected.

Phuketwan can reveal that only two Andaman resorts have signed up so far to provide the comprehensive but costly warning service on offer from the National Disaster Warning Centre.

The beach warning tower system that stretches along the coast is imperfect but probably adequate, combined with television and radio, during daylight hours.

But the question that needs to be asked repeatedly is this: what happens if a second tsunami comes at 3am, everybody is asleep, and the radios and television sets have been switched off for hours?

Dr Plodprasop Surasawadee, assistant minister of the Prime Minister’s Office, was quoted in the Bangkok Post as saying on Phuket on Wednesday: ''Now, the NDWC is no different from a deserted toilet.

''It cannot be used. The centre has no budget, no manpower and no decision-makers.''

-- for more, go to phuketwan.com

Thailand's long love affair with the motorcycle has been matched by a pasionate fling with the mobile phone. The take-up rate has far outpaced adoption of the Internet, for example.

Most Thai adults now seem to carry a telephone everywhere they go, and plenty of school children have them, too.

With Thailand's population at almost 62.5 million, that's a lot of mobile chatter.

A single company, AIS, expects to sell 8.5 million mobile telephones in 2008 and another nine million in 2009.

It's been said that some Thais see motorcycles as a useful invention to make a couple of vanity mirrors easily transportable.

Some islanders are able to check their hairstyle and chat to a friend on a mobile while travelling the wrong way or going through the red light at an intersection.

Such sightings may become less frequent now as the police pursue the mobile mobile users.

It is not clear yet, though, whether the crafty motorcyclists who tuck their mobile telephone into the chinstrap of their helmets are legal or illegal.

Some frequent mobile telephone users consider that to be the reason why helmets were invented.

--More at Phuketwan.com

Amid the aftermath of the Burma cyclone comes something positive: a serious attempt by the Employment and Immigration departments on Phuket to find jobs for an extra 20,000 Burmese.

A plan is underway to boost the island's construction industry by helping 20,000 illegal Burmese working on the island to become legal.

The new strategy comes at a critical moment, by coincidence at the same time as the killer cyclone that struck Burma's heartland this week, killing thousands.

What the cyclone will do is drive still more Burmese to seek food, sanctuary and a more prosperous life along the Andaman coast of Thailand.

Some will resort to paying ''snake head'' traffickers for space on cramped and unseaworthy vessels, despite the perils of ocean travel amid monsoons at this time of year.

Others will resort to the same kind of subterfuge that on April 9 led to the deaths of 54 Burmese in an airtight container truck bound from the border town of Ranong tor Phuket.

Yet those Burmese who do manage to reach Phuket now have an improved chance of finding work.

The attempt to help the construction industry find the workers it needs has been sparked by Nataya Anudit, Chief of Phuket Provincial Employment Office.

Under existing arrangements, 35,116 Burmese have ID cards and work on Phuket in a variety of industries. This is 5000 more than in 2007, but still not enough to meet demand.

Last year, Khun Nataya and representatives from leading industries on the island went to northern provinces in the Isarn region to try to attract more Thais to work in Phuket.

Isarn workers are highly regarded, especially in the construction industry. But as a result of the Phuket initiative, just nine workers came south to the island.

The problem is that Isarn workers mostly much prefer Bangkok, where wages tend to be better and home is not so far away.

Several hundred highly-rated Isarn workers failed to return to Phuket after the Songkran holiday last month because of the high price of rice and the shortage of supplies on island shelves.

This explains why Khun Nataya is now attempting to find another source of legal workers for the demanding construction industry.

Throughout June, legal Burmese will be able to renew their existing ID cards.

Meanwhile, Khun Nataya holds hope that the 20,000 illegal workers will be able to become legal if her plan is adopted at national level in Bangkok.

She has already met with the Superintendent of Phuket Immigration, Police Colonel Chanatpol Yongbunjerd, who supports the idea.

-- For the complete report, go to phuketwan.com

quote: "A total of 38,368 domestic and international flights landed and took off from the airport in 2007, a 32.34 percent increase on the previous year. "

According to AOT's official stats for Phuket airport in 2007 there were 40,799 flights up 32.09%. (small difference)

quote: "About 5.5 million passengers arrived last year,.."

According to AOT's official stats there were 2,845,944 arrivals (big difference), 2,841,154 departing, so sub-total 5,687,098 plus 17,267 in transit; so total 5,704,365.

------

Statistics are revealed for Phuket & Krabi airports in March 2008.

The Airports of Thailand company who manage Phuket international Airport have revealed to Andaman News their statistics for March 2008 showing 4,041 aircraft movements or flights in and out, a 10.38% increase on March 2007. The total number of passengers, both domestic and international, in and out, was 638,119 an increase of 20.76% and only 2% less the record-breaking month of February 2008 when there were 652,468 passengers. The amount of freight was 1,839 tonnes which was actually down 3.67% compared to last year's month. Meanwhile the Department of Civil Aviation who manage Krabi International Airport, reported that there were 776 flights in and out, a 8.49% decrease on last March, but the number of passengers was 106,331 actually up 23.01% due to bigger aircraft than last year. The freight was 142,037 kilograms, up an impressive 40.07%.

Andaman News NBT (VHF dial) at 8.30am & local Cable TV channel 1 + maybe FM90.5 Radio Thailand 6pm, broadcast to Phang Nga, Krabi & Phuket provinces, & possibly FM108 Mazz Radio 7.30pm in Phuket, Wednesday 30 April 2008 & http://news.prd.go.th or http://thainews.prd.go.th/newsenglish

The figures Phuketwan was given were supplied by the AOT, too. As an anonymous media entity, you have now succeeded in promoting your own media outlet. Isn't it now time for you to head off and cover an elite modelling competition somewhere?

A TALL observation tower overlooking Phang Nga Bay is part of a plan to centralise Phang Nga's administration in a new 300-rai development project.

The project, brainchild of the Governor, Wichai Praisa-Ngob, is aimed at helping Phang Nga to compete with Phuket as a tourist destination.

''Phuket has the airport and most resorts,'' he told Phuketwan. in an exclusive interview. ''But tourists come to see the beauty of Phang Nga.

''We want them to come and stay longer here, too. That way, Phang Nga gets some of the revenue, rather than just day-trippers.''

The spectacular 120-metre tower will have four lifts that can carry visitors high enough to see over the 200 million baht development to beautiful Phang Nga Bay.

At the base will be a souvenir shop and a one village one product store.

Governor Wichai, appointed six months ago, is planning to bring Phang Nga's central administratve headquarters to the new site.

Other important facilities to be relocated to the new riverland park site include the OrBorJor, a large meeting centre, the court block, the electoral office, the land titles office, police and marine police stations, the vehicle registration office, the education office, a culture centre and a health centre.

There will also be a mini-suburb as accommodation for staff for all those departments.

The project, which Governor Wichai says could be completed in two years, is on a tract of land on the banks of the Phang Nga River, not far from the existing township.

Tenders are to be invited from private companies for the right to build the project.

''The people of Phang Nga are being invited first to say what they think of the tower design,'' the governor said.

''When we know what the people think, we will be able to go to the next phase.''

The land has already been cleared and levelled, awaiting the go-ahead.

''Phang Nga really deserves a larger share of the income from tourism,'' he said.

''At the moment, Phuket gets more than its share. The tower is one way of making sure both provinces get a fair deal.

''If tourists want to relax in a beautiful natural environment, then Phang Nga should be their destination. If tourists want nightlife, then their ticket should be to Phuket or Pattaya.''

from phuketwan.com