it's almost May and it's still in the red every day. I think it's also raining a bit every night and it is still very unhealthy.

 

I don't remember lasting this long in the past.

In the old days, rice fields were burned down. Since rice pledging scheme fiasco, many turned to corn, cassava, sugarcane fields. What's left on fields after harvest varies a lot, depending on what was harvested, so fields now have a lot more to burn, hence causing a lot more pollution.

 

Then you have rising temperatures, which are an accelerant for chemical reactions, which make pollution even worse.

 

This isn't new, it's more than 10 years on a steady decline, both in quality of air as well as duration. Going back to 2012, smog in Bangkok lasted only about 2 months in Feb and Mar, where it was over AQI 75, which was from my reader in the middle of the city. Now it's getting close to 6 months that readings are over 100 at least 20 days in a calendar month.

 

The reason for the HEPA filters and sensors for me was intense headaches that started when I moved to Pratunam. Had no idea why. A friend stayed over and brought this black box from China. Headaches stopped. Asked what that was and learned it was HEPA filter. Had one in each room since then, that's 20 years ago. A few years later I saw first pm2.5 sensors for sale. Had one mounted outside ever since.

 

Which now also leads me to something else - that IQAir is downplaying actual numbers. I'm contributor to them. My sensor is weekly checked against others, but it consistently reads higher than the same sensor appearing in AirVisual app. Sometimes double that. IQAir states "data calibrated by IQAir"... Yesterday's numbers were 158 from my sensor and 91 from same sensor at AirVisual at the same time. Don't understand why they are doing that.

 

As I'm quite high up, I can actually tell the approximate pollution figures by looking out the window, which buildings I can see. Another one is that my indoor air filters have sensors and show figures on their displays, which are in 5-10% of outside pollution range. So 10 inside would be 100-200 outside. And if they start making jet take off sounds, which happens at 75 inside, I'm not leaving the room. It sometimes does just that at 4-4.30 am. Loud enough to wake me up.

 

That didn't happen much in the past but it is getting more frequent, especially in February.

"I don't remember lasting this long in the past."

 

I do, as they arrived very late last year.   Sticks in my mind, as the rain usually starts end of April, first week of May.   Brother told me last year, May 20ish, that after Nam this year, thinking of come to TH afterwards, and I told him not to, as too hot, too polluted, or rainy.  Rains have not started enough to knock down the pollution, or dampen everything enough so they'd stop burning, at that time.

 

He did can the idea, though will be in Nam this week, as OZ, NZ & Nam was already booked.  Bummer, as it's the same as here now ... crap air.  He rescheduled TH for first of Nov, this year.

Bye bye LOS I went to Cambodia

40 minutes ago, tomazbodner said:

Which now also leads me to something else - that IQAir is downplaying actual numbers.

As I can't edit it anymore, I wanted to add screenshots of this:

 

This is what sensor actually read at noon, when it got a beep from IQAir to fetch the data:

 

And this is what AirVisual by IQAir actually showed a few minutes later:

 

That's quite a discrepancy... Or is it that it doesn't use all data? No idea. But makes me curious about trusting AirVisual numbers now.

5 hours ago, Celsius said:

it's almost May and it's still in the red every day. I think it's also raining a bit every night and it is still very unhealthy.

 

I don't remember lasting this long in the past.

 

Sad to say but BKK is simply unlivable these days.

Last time I went there I was drained after a week.

Same goes for Chiang Mai btw.

 

 

 

Why we live where we do ... choose wisely 

 

On 4/21/2024 at 4:30 PM, TheFatOne said:

 

Sad to say but BKK is simply unlivable these days.

Last time I went there I was drained after a week.

Same goes for Chiang Mai btw.

 

 

 

 

Drained in bang cock

 

Sounds like a deal

On 4/21/2024 at 4:30 PM, TheFatOne said:

 

Sad to say but BKK is simply unlivable these days.

Last time I went there I was drained after a week.

Same goes for Chiang Mai btw.

 

 

 

Not just Bangkok and Chiang Mai - pretty much all over Thailand and SE Asia, except in the deep south.  Just something you have to put up with if you have to live here.

On 5/8/2024 at 1:33 PM, brewsterbudgen said:

Not just Bangkok and Chiang Mai - pretty much all over Thailand and SE Asia, except in the deep south.  Just something you have to put up with if you have to live here.

Very good post.

"If you have to live here"

I realized I don't have to.

It has been really nice to live in a place where I can breathe the air.

A bit sad, so.