Thai Air Force Sprays Water Over Haze-choked North

[p1p]

Thai Air Force Sprays Water Over Haze-Choked North

Planet Ark

THAILAND: March 19, 2007

BANGKOK - Royal Thai Air Force planes sprayed water over smog-choked northern Thailand on Saturday in the latest effort to provoke rains to clear away the thick haze.

After a week of failure to provoke a deluge from the sky, rainmaking teams have added water to their chemical mix of fertiliser and salt sprayed from planes to make rain in hopes that would be more effective, officials said.

"It works well and weather conditions in Chiang Mai are better than in the last few days. It is still cloudy, but the sky is clearer now," Somchai Ruangsuttinaruparp, director of the regional rainmaking centre, said by telephone from Thailand's second largest city.

"We have to keep doing this until the situation is back to normal," he added.

The region has not seen rain since November in what has been an unusually long and dry cool season in Thailand.

Smoke from burning fields and forests in Thailand, neighbouring Laos and Myanmar has poured into valleys in the hilly region as a cold front prevented it from escaping into the atmosphere.

But the air quality in Chiang Mai had improved in recent days following efforts by fire fighters to put out forest fires and burning stubble, environment officials said.

The Air Quality Index had dropped to 114, a level mildly affecting the health of children and the elderly, from 247, a level at which the smoke affects everyone's health heavily.

REUTERS NEWS SERVICE

[solent01]

My wife told me this morning that on the news they were saying that they are still seeding, tonight for the last hour or so we have been watching a fantastic storm, with moderate rain in our town, the rain is easing off now but the storm is still rumbling away to the north of us, we live 150 clicks north of CM city.