Samui Tourism Not Affected By Plane Crash

[Boater]

Samui International Airport is back to normal two weeks after a Bangkok Airways aircraft slammed into an old tower when it skidded off the runway in a freak accident that killed a pilot and injured many others, some of them seriously. Airport officials say that the number of daily flights is back to pre-accident level. Local and foreign tourists arriving and departing daily are in droves, an indication it’s business at usual on Samui and Koh Phangan.

Bangkok Airways has resumed normal operation with more than 30 flights daily to and from the airport, one official said. Thai Airways has also resumed its operation, with two round-trip daily flights between Samui and Bangkok.

Mr. Seni Phuwasethaworn, president of the Tourism Association of Koh Samui, said the airplane crash did not affect the island’s tourism at all.

Panu Woramit, director of Suratthani’s tourism office, said the crash “had not cast a bad spell” over the island’s tourism, judging from the fact there were no reports of room cancellations.

He said about 70 percent of 16,500 rooms on Koh Samui had been booked. Most of the tourists were from Europe followed by Thailand and other parts of Asia .

On neighboring Koh Phangan, an estimated 20,000 tourists reveled at this month’s full-moon party on Hat Rin beach.

Samui police chief Saran Macharoen said over 60 witnesses were to be interviewed by crash investigators. Weathermen of the Samui meteorological office had also been asked to provide information about the weather conditions on the island at the time of the accident, Col. Saran said.

The result of the full investigation into Bangkok Airways plane crash could be known within a month, Deputy Permanent Secretary for Transport Chaisak Angkasuwan said.

Chaisak said it may take about a month for investigators to determine the cause of the accident. The black box and the pilots’ voice record had been retrieved from the site of the accident.

The cause of the accident could be bad weather, human error or a defective engine part, he said. 5

http://news.samuiexpress.net/local-list/53...ane-crash-.html