Chiang Rai dust particle levels at highest in country's north

Back from a run to Mae Sai and it was bad. Could not see the hills both sides of #1 and my eyes are still burning back here at home. Visibilty was at best 2-3 miles. Worst I have seen even after LA during their worst.

The smoke is very thick and extensive, I flew to Bangkok on Saturday and I would say it went to well over 10,000 feet and stretched nearly to the coast.

Three days out of Thailand and my nose has stopped running.

Chiang Rai Haze Still Critical

Thinking of getting masks with carbon filters - like those I used when cycling in Bangkok.

But as a wise man once said, what’s the point you still have to take it off to drink that beer.

Recently near Doi Chang.

People keep sending me emails asking when things will get better and they can visit Chiang Rai again. I tell them June.

And its getting worse and worse. Yesterday was horrendous! I tried to enjoy an outside meal and coughed my way through it!

Today's not that much better, was thinking of having a few beers down Ricos ? But smoke is doing my head in !

Can I ask does this not make some of you want to pack up your things and leave,I understand that many people have jobs and family and the like but this seems to be self torture I can not imagine living with this ?

Hope it gets better soon.

We did pack up and leave in 2007 but came back last June after four years in Phuket, Mrs CM and I have talked about it but on balance we prefer CM and are prepared to put up with the six weeks each year when the pollution is really bad.

Is the rain gone now and have they started burning again?

the smoke is back .... did you sign up already?

http://www.breathecampaign.net/

It's back all right and looks just as bad as ever.

Any evacuation orders yet?

At the next Pot Luck i am sure a rain dance will be performed if it has not rained by then and the members have any breath left.

Just overnight the sun is invisible, it is cold and our eyes are burning.

At the next Pot Luck i am sure a rain dance will be performed if it has not rained by then and the members have any breath left.

I'm back home in three weeks and planning on going on some long awaited rides on my bike. Knowing my luck, to everybody else favour, it will probably pour down.

This video highlights just how bad it is this year

http://www.breathecampaign.net/sign-our-petition/

4 pm sun here 30 k east of CR on the old CM Hwy.

Very heavy smoke. We leave for Canada in the morning, be interesting to see from the air.

4 pm sun here 30 k east of CR on the old CM Hwy.

Very heavy smoke. We leave for Canada in the morning, be interesting to see from the air.

Just arrived back from our house on Koh Chang and going back as soon as I do my buisness here. The air on the Island is clear and smoke free. I am sending more furniture to Koh Chang and once I have arranged a truck we are OFF.

Wishful thinking, probably, but now that the smog issue has reached the international press and it must be clear to tourism chiefs that the cash cow is choking, perhaps we will see some meaningful action from the Government.

http://www.telegraph...rist-trail.html

Edited March 31, 201214 yr by sidelines

Maybe they can have a rain dance at that thing at the meridian today.

If things were only so simple.

Ah, the irony. A story in today's Bangkok Post points the finger at the agri-business for causing the worst of the smog pollution in northern Thailand. They urge farmers to grow corn - prompting them to burn forest land - to produce eco-friendly ethanol. So northern Thailand is being polluted to keep the air clean in traffic-clogged Bangkok. Okay that's over-simplifying the problem but the irony is plain for all to see (on smog-free days that is).

Link removed.

Edited April 27, 201214 yr by Rooo
Bangkok Post link removed.

Does that mean opium is easier on the environment than corn?

Things are still quite bad out where I live. Here is my take on the burning of paradise.

Last night.

Ah, the irony. A story in today's Bangkok Post points the finger at the agri-business for causing the worst of the smog pollution in northern Thailand. They urge farmers to grow corn - prompting them to burn forest land - to produce eco-friendly ethanol. So northern Thailand is being polluted to keep the air clean in traffic-clogged Bangkok. Okay that's over-simplifying the problem but the irony is plain for all to see (on smog-free days that is).

Link removed.

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