Khon Kaen resort owner files suit against govt over flooding

By The Nation

 

 

A resort owner in Khon Kaen has sued the Khon Kaen Water Management committee for its failure to prevent floods that extensively damaged her business.

Preeyarat Nuansing, owner of Ban Chom Dao Resort in Muang Khon Kaen district, on Monday filed a lawsuit against the provincial water management committee with the Khon Kaen Administrative Court based on her claim that the committee had failed to adequately manage water in Ubonrat Dam, which resulted in prolonged flooding that affected her resort.

 

The water management committee, chaired by Khon Kaen Governor Somsak Jangtrakul, has been responsible for controlling water discharges from Ubonrat Dam.

 

Due to large volumes of incoming water during the rainy season, dam exceeded its storage capacity, causing widespread flooding both upstream and downstream of the dam.

 

Preeyarat said the flooding had already caused Bt1-million opportunity losses for her business and Bt2 million in flood damage to the property.

 

“A lot of livestock at the resort died," Preeyarat said. "The peacocks also died. Three rai [0.5 hectares] of my cattle farm was damaged entirely. I only wonder who will responsible for these damages."

 

She added that this year was the second time that her resort and farm had been damaged by flooding, after the 2011 deluge caused damages worth Bt3 million. After those floods, she only received Bt5,000 in compensation from authorities.

 

“I wonder why the committee, which has the real-time water situation in hand, failed to properly manage the water in Ubonrat Dam and prevent floods. Why did they not drain the water, if they knew there would be large incoming flows at the dam?” she asked.

 

“I want to ask the Administrative Court to help investigate this issue and let this lawsuit be a lesson for authorities.”

 

Source: http://www.nationmultimedia.com/detail/breakingnews/30330952

 

-- © Copyright The Nation 2017-11-06

And this is the look on their faces..

 

 

Are class action suits allowed in Thailand?

Sent from my ASUS_Z010D using Thailand Forum - Thaivisa mobile app

Good luck with that. Hope you have deep pockets and a taste for prison food.

Yea, and next year she will sue them for not providing enough water during the drought, people seems to don't understand that flooding and drought has been a part of Thailand's history and that it will continue the same way in the future until the government have learned how control the weather....

11 minutes ago, Kasset Tak said:

Yea, and next year she will sue them for not providing enough water during the drought, people seems to don't understand that flooding and drought has been a part of Thailand's history and that it will continue the same way in the future until the government have learned how control the weather....

 

Not completely true.. you can prevent floodings caused by overflowing dams by having a larger safety margin. However this would mean more chance that there later is less water for farmers (because you keep your overall levels lower). Then you got farmers that complain.

 

I feel she has a valid complaint, the dams should be managed better making sure they never overflow because of too much water. Just keep a larger safety margin. in 2011 the extra water from the dams also made the flooding worse. 

 

Of course if they take this action the farmers wont be happy as they have a larger chance of less water. So it all depends what is more important general population or farmers.

A claim for the Government in lieu of an insurance?

Guess the army will blame the next 'interim' government !

I wonder if she understands about peeing into a headwind?  Mmm.................

1 hour ago, RichardColeman said:

Guess the army will blame the next 'interim' government !

Or the last one

2 hours ago, robblok said:

Not completely true.. you can prevent floodings caused by overflowing dams by having a larger safety margin. However this would mean more chance that there later is less water for farmers (because you keep your overall levels lower). Then you got farmers that complain.

 

How about a larger dam?

1 hour ago, janclaes47 said:

 

How about a larger dam?

Who knows if the area is suited for it... why not. 

4 hours ago, webfact said:

Khon Kaen resort owner files suit against govt

You can forget about that folks. Article 44 will put a quick stop to that nonsense. In fact Article 44 might even take possession of your resort like it did with a well known gold mine. 

I wish the resort a lot of luck on getting compensation. (but I won't hold my breath for them).

6 hours ago, webfact said:

“I wonder why the committee, which has the real-time water situation in hand, failed to properly manage the water in Ubonrat Dam and prevent floods. Why did they not drain the water, if they knew there would be large incoming flows at the dam?” she asked.

When you tolerate a mai pen rai attitude for too long, it shouldn't exactly come as a surprise.

A basic misunderstanding of the purpose of a dam, which is to store water and mitigate flooding.