1,000 Boats To Push Flood Waters From Chao Phraya River

[MaxYakov]

So what happened? I had the news on all night and not one mention or image of the breathtaking idea. Were even the news channels too embarrassed to run the story?

As ex Military, I can only imagine for a second the sheer horror of the Navy personnel being ordered to participate in something that could only have been code named Operation Futility. The Science Minister must be in line for the Academic equivalent of the Darwin Awards.

It ran on Thai PBS which is running round-the-clock flood coverage. The Thai Navy experiencing the 'sheer horror' of having to follow orders from politicos, as usual (or maybe not-so-usual in Thaland?). Up til now, I thought they were hiding out. Other than the tugs, I haven't seen any indication of other Navy vessels participating. At this point I'd say the good Minister doesn't give a flying bridge about his Academic credentials. Does he have any?

[Thai at Heart]

Just caught the news this morning with someone describing how right now they are trying to protect a certain part of the river that is considered the most important to protect the city.

It may be a good or bad thing, but it appeared to me that the entire effort at sandbagging, monitoring and managing the whole thing was being done by civilians. Maybe all the government and civil service people were in that raft of Fortuners I saw heading north yesterday?

[MaxYakov]

So what happened? I had the news on all night and not one mention or image of the breathtaking idea. Were even the news channels too embarrassed to run the story?

As ex Military, I can only imagine for a second the sheer horror of the Navy personnel being ordered to participate in something that could only have been code named Operation Futility. The Science Minister must be in line for the Academic equivalent of the Darwin Awards.

Do some google and you will find out that the science minister has a Darwin gold card.

As for the quietness,that's the usual Thai reaction when something fails.Keep quiet and hope everyone forget soon

Yes, he's got the gold card, but its primary basis can't be discussed on this forum. The water-churning was covered on Thai PBS last night even before 11 PM, but the video didn't show anything additional to the images we've already seen. Thai PBS has been doing good flood coverage, 24/7 with focus yesterday on the Nakhon Sawan 300-meter levee breach. It's pretty disastrous, but they're handling it very well, I'd say. They're showing video apparently shot last night right now.

As I've said before, there's no practical way to determine failure or success of the 'water diversion' so it can't be falsified so it can't fail (for political reasons but can be said to succeed for the same reasons), unless some prop wash undeniably takes out a flood barrier, which I'm sure they're trying to avoid (making it undeniable).

Edited October 12, 2011 by MaxYakov

[Buchholz]

So what happened? I had the news on all night and not one mention or image of the breathtaking idea. Were even the news channels too embarrassed to run the story?

As ex Military, I can only imagine for a second the sheer horror of the Navy personnel being ordered to participate in something that could only have been code named Operation Futility. The Science Minister must be in line for the Academic equivalent of the Darwin Awards.

It ran on Thai PBS which is running round-the-clock flood coverage. The Thai Navy experiencing the 'sheer horror' of having to follow orders from politicos, as usual (or maybe not-so-usual in Thaland?). Up til now, I thought they were hiding out. Other than the tugs, I haven't seen any indication of other Navy vessels participating. At this point I'd say the good Minister doesn't give a flying bridge about his Academic credentials. Does he have any?

His degree is in forestry.

.

[MaxYakov]

Just caught the news this morning with someone describing how right now they are trying to protect a certain part of the river that is considered the most important to protect the city.

It may be a good or bad thing, but it appeared to me that the entire effort at sandbagging, monitoring and managing the whole thing was being done by civilians. Maybe all the government and civil service people were in that raft of Fortuners I saw heading north yesterday?

Wow! That must have been a BIG raft if was carrying 'all the government and civil service people' as well as their SUVs. Maybe it was Toyota getting some vehicles out of Bangkok before what happens to them what happened to an entire lot of several hundred vehicles in Nahkon Sawan. Don't know why they would be going north, though.

[GentlemanJim]

So what happened? I had the news on all night and not one mention or image of the breathtaking idea. Were even the news channels too embarrassed to run the story?

As ex Military, I can only imagine for a second the sheer horror of the Navy personnel being ordered to participate in something that could only have been code named Operation Futility. The Science Minister must be in line for the Academic equivalent of the Darwin Awards.

It ran on Thai PBS which is running round-the-clock flood coverage. The Thai Navy experiencing the 'sheer horror' of having to follow orders from politicos, as usual (or maybe not-so-usual in Thaland?). Up til now, I thought they were hiding out. Other than the tugs, I haven't seen any indication of other Navy vessels participating. At this point I'd say the good Minister doesn't give a flying bridge about his Academic credentials. Does he have any?

Thai at Heart, on 26 minutes ago, said:

Just caught the news this morning with someone describing how right now they are trying to protect a certain part of the river that is considered the most important to protect the city.

It may be a good or bad thing, but it appeared to me that the entire effort at sandbagging, monitoring and managing the whole thing was being done by civilians. Maybe all the government and civil service people were in that raft of Fortuners I saw heading north yesterday?

Wow! That must have been a BIG raft if was carrying 'all the government and civil service people' as well as their SUVs. Maybe it was Toyota getting some vehicles out of Bangkok before what happens to them what happened to an entire lot of several hundred vehicles in Nahkon Sawan. Don't know why they would be going north, though.

Max

I really have no idea where you are coming from. Are you some kinda Government plant here on Thai Visa? I think we should be told! I don't tune in to PBS, perhaps you should take out some form of advertising on here if you are a PBS shareholder. And yes, do you think every Military commander takes orders from a politician without thinking in the back of their mind sometimes, "what a <deleted>**ing stupid idea". Just as they would have done with this one? Tugs or not, the Navy were there, so whats your point Max?

Edited October 12, 2011 by GentlemanJim

[MaxYakov]

So what happened? I had the news on all night and not one mention or image of the breathtaking idea. Were even the news channels too embarrassed to run the story?

As ex Military, I can only imagine for a second the sheer horror of the Navy personnel being ordered to participate in something that could only have been code named Operation Futility. The Science Minister must be in line for the Academic equivalent of the Darwin Awards.

It ran on Thai PBS which is running round-the-clock flood coverage. The Thai Navy experiencing the 'sheer horror' of having to follow orders from politicos, as usual (or maybe not-so-usual in Thaland?). Up til now, I thought they were hiding out. Other than the tugs, I haven't seen any indication of other Navy vessels participating. At this point I'd say the good Minister doesn't give a flying bridge about his Academic credentials. Does he have any?

His degree is in forestry.

.

Thanks. I would have guessed Occult science. Maybe it's a hobby.

[janverbeem]

So what happened? I had the news on all night and not one mention or image of the breathtaking idea. Were even the news channels too embarrassed to run the story?

As ex Military, I can only imagine for a second the sheer horror of the Navy personnel being ordered to participate in something that could only have been code named Operation Futility. The Science Minister must be in line for the Academic equivalent of the Darwin Awards.

Do some google and you will find out that the science minister has a Darwin gold card.

As for the quietness,that's the usual Thai reaction when something fails.Keep quiet and hope everyone forget soon

dam_n !!!! I thought the minister would either come forward to admit it was a mistake in judgment and cancel the whole excercise. Or run the exercise and deal with the failure of it. I never counted upon a news blackout........These government guys really are pretty tricky.

I don't think it is a news blackout.......................You should take into consideration that it's very difficult to write an news article while you're rolling over the floor from laughing.

[BabySun]

So what happened? I had the news on all night and not one mention or image of the breathtaking idea. Were even the news channels too embarrassed to run the story?

As ex Military, I can only imagine for a second the sheer horror of the Navy personnel being ordered to participate in something that could only have been code named Operation Futility. The Science Minister must be in line for the Academic equivalent of the Darwin Awards.

It ran on Thai PBS which is running round-the-clock flood coverage. The Thai Navy experiencing the 'sheer horror' of having to follow orders from politicos, as usual (or maybe not-so-usual in Thaland?). Up til now, I thought they were hiding out. Other than the tugs, I haven't seen any indication of other Navy vessels participating. At this point I'd say the good Minister doesn't give a flying bridge about his Academic credentials. Does he have any?

His degree is in forestry.

.

Thanks. I would have guessed Occult science. Maybe it's a hobby.

Occult Science? -no,this is arithmetic and simple physics on grammar school level.Read another thread here about airport protection from floods.

All silly jokes presented in this thread are actually working at airport:scooping water?,storing water in buckets? - all these they implemented at the airport - by design.

They have 8(eight) high power water pumps which scoops water and send it to storage reservoire and canals to sea.This is enough to keep airport dry.

One pump sucks 10 cubic meters per second.

What about 1000 boats?On Alibaba you can find pumps with power suitable for boats - 100kW,they suck 1 cubic meter/second..Together?1000tons/sec - 25% of Chiao Praya flow during flood time.

So,gentleman - Mr.Minister is right and you are wrong!

Edited October 12, 2011 by Scott
problematic portion edited out

[Scott]

Nonsensical posts and reply have been deleted.

Please stay on topic.

[thaimite]

His degree is in forestry.

So now we've got to the ROOT of the problem

Does he have TREE FELLERS to help him?

[EyesWideOpen]

Any word on progress yet ??

Edited October 12, 2011 by EyesWideOpen

[MaxYakov]

< snipped a couple of nested quote sets due to the restrictive quote level limitations >

Max

I really have no idea where you are coming from. Are you some kinda Government plant here on Thai Visa? I think we should be told! I don't tune in to PBS, perhaps you should take out some form of advertising on here if you are a PBS shareholder. And yes, do you think every Military commander takes orders from a politician without thinking in the back of their mind sometimes, "what a &lt;deleted&gt;**ing stupid idea". Just as they would have done with this one? Tugs or not, the Navy were there, so whats your point Max?

Jim, Jim. Please be a gentleman. I have come, not recently, from the USN Submarine Service where we were one command level away from a civilian president/politician and the only 'sheer horror' would to have been ordered to launch nuclear-warhead ballistic missiles. Of course, submarine sailors have been notoriously ... let's say ... authority-resistant.

What's in the backs of Thai sailors' minds when ordered to do anything by anyone I didn't and couldn't speculate about, but I could not see how it could have been 'sheer horror' in this case. You seemed to be making a point about what you believed would have been their negative opinion of their participation in the 'water diversion' effort. Are you thinking for the Thai Navy these days?

Up until yesterday, people were speculating about the absence of the obvious presence of the Thai Navy in this 'water diversion' experiment. But it was only speculation, since from the news and the forum their level of participation, if any, was not mentioned.

As far as my mentioning Navy tugs on the Tha PBS, it was only to indicate that the Thai PBS covered only what we had seen yesterday and the presence of additional vessels, Thai Navy or not, was not seen. I did not mean to form any kind of judgment of the level of participation by the Thai Navy beyond what the news coverage indicated. I have no way of knowing that. Do you?

I have no affiliation or interest in Thai PBS. I mentioned it specifically because it seemed to have the best coverage AND so people would know exactly where to go for it.

And, no, I'm not 'some kinda Government plant', but do really you think I (or Thai Visa) would/should tell you if I were? Are you a paranoid, conspiracy theorist?

[wana]

Occult Science? -no,this is arithmetic and simple physics on grammar school level.Read another thread here about airport protection from floods.

All silly jokes presented in this thread are actually working at airport:scooping water?,storing water in buckets? - all these they implemented at the airport - by design.

They have 8(eight) high power water pumps which scoops water and send it to storage reservoire and canals to sea.This is enough to keep airport dry.

One pump sucks 10 cubic meters per second.

What about 1000 boats?On Alibaba you can find pumps with power suitable for boats - 100kW,they suck 1 cubic meter/second..Together?1000tons/sec - 25% of Chiao Praya flow during flood time.

So,gentleman - Mr.Minister is right and you are wrong!

lets put your "theory" into practice

1000 large boat gets one of these super pumps and we plant the boats in the chayo-praya -

as soon as they start sucking up "1000 tons of water per second" ,please tell us where this water will be stored ?

[Gary A]

lets put your "theory" into practice

1000 large boat gets one of these super pumps and we plant the boats in the chayo-praya -

as soon as they start sucking up "1000 tons of water per second" ,please tell us where this water will be stored ?

The Gulf of Thailand is a pretty big storage container, wouldn't you think? To determine if the boats work or not would be fairly simple. You would need to monitor the speed of the current downstream. I for one think it works but have no idea to what extent. Before wasting a lot of money and effort, the current needs to be measured with the boats stopped and with the boats running.

[Mugg]

OMG Please, Please, Please if this is televised please post it .... I have not had this much fun since the pigs ate my little brother....

[wana]

are the boats going to be in the gulf of thailand or the chayo-praya ? they cant be in both places at once

the storage capacity of the boats will not take long to fill at 1000 cubic metres per second ,also when the boats get heavier they will displace more water over the banks

all river travel is prohibited already because the water is so close to breaking through the banks (1000 big heavy boats will displace more than the boats that are already prohibited )

Edited October 12, 2011 by wana

[MaxYakov]

His degree is in forestry.

.

Thanks. I would have guessed Occult science. Maybe it's a hobby.

Occult Science? -no,this is arithmetic and simple physics on grammar school level.Read another thread here about airport protection from floods.

All silly jokes presented in this thread are actually working at airport:scooping water?,storing water in buckets? - all these they implemented at the airport - by design.

They have 8(eight) high power water pumps which scoops water and send it to storage reservoire and canals to sea.This is enough to keep airport dry.

One pump sucks 10 cubic meters per second.

What about 1000 boats?On Alibaba you can find pumps with power suitable for boats - 100kW,they suck 1 cubic meter/second..Together?1000tons/sec - 25% of Chiao Praya flow during flood time.

So,gentleman - Mr.Minister is right and you are wrong!

Are they using extremely low-flying 747s also at the airport as well to blow the water away? If they are, they got the idea from me and I want the credit for it.

You say the airport pumps can push 80 cubic meters/sec (combined)? That's 1/50 of the recently stated total Phraya flow (4000 cubic meters/sec)? Are you sure about that?

As to the Alibaba pumps, they sound impressive. But, first. one must have 1000 boats, and then install them on the boats in a way to accelerate Phraya water - it would best they be submerged, so they would have to be expensive, submersible pumps. It's an interesting idea. both impractical and expensive.

The pumps could be used on or near the shore to accelerate the Phraya water instead of using them on boats or even using boat propellers as a water-accelerator. However, due to 'grammar school' physics, they would have to be solidly affixed to something, which considerably complicates any design where they are submerged.

But for any substantial action to be taken on any such plans, I would hope there would be a proper analysis done that might press grammar school arithmetic and physics a bit.

Of course 'Mr.Minister [sic] is right' in the case of his 'water-diversion' experiment - partially due to people like you, but mainly because he cannot easily be proved wrong (not to mention that nobody [in Thailand] would be crazy enough to even attempt it - another story entirely). Plus he, hopefully, has the Water Goddess on his side.

[Thai at Heart]

But where to put it? And where to send the water? Maybe the science minister would like to send it back up to Chiangmai to make another flood up there?

Worlds biggest pump

As for putting boats in the river, the amount of energy needed to "increase" the flow is enormous. They could probably put every boat with a Thai flag in the river and it still wouldn't amount to much more than a ripple, 100m down the river,(as was already noted by the Marine department who definitely know more about the flow of the Chao Praya than any Thai science minister.)

I blame it on the fact that thai kids only take showers and not baths and understand that if you slosh the water up to one end, the other end gets shallower.

Edited October 12, 2011 by Thai at Heart

[Scott]

One off-topic post deleted. Please try to be reasonable in your posts.

[MaxYakov]

OMG Please, Please, Please if this is televised please post it .... I have not had this much fun since the pigs ate my little brother....

Please post the video of your little brother being eaten by pigs. I'm sure we'd all have much more fun with that.

[Gary A]

are the boats going to be in the gulf of thailand or the chayo-praya ? they cant be in both places at once

the storage capacity of the boats will not take long to fill at 1000 cubic metres per second ,also when the boats get heavier they will displace more water over the banks

all river travel is prohibited already because the water is so close to breaking through the banks (1000 big heavy boats will displace more than the boats that are already prohibited )

Think about this for a minute. WHY would you want boats in the Gulf? Why would you want to store water in the boats? The idea is to make the water move towards the Gulf faster by using the boat's prop wash to increase the speed of the current.

[blabla1]

Hmmmm, i guess there's not enough time to get it to Myth busters....

[wana]

are the boats going to be in the gulf of thailand or the chayo-praya ? they cant be in both places at once

the storage capacity of the boats will not take long to fill at 1000 cubic metres per second ,also when the boats get heavier they will displace more water over the banks

all river travel is prohibited already because the water is so close to breaking through the banks (1000 big heavy boats will displace more than the boats that are already prohibited )

Think about this for a minute. WHY would you want boats in the Gulf? Why would you want to store water in the boats? The idea is to make the water move towards the Gulf faster by using the boat's prop wash to increase the speed of the current.

that prop wash idea was tried yesterday and hasnt been mentioned since .....no results have been publicised so take from that what you will ,if it worked or had the slightest positive effect would they not be doing it again today ?

the problem with buying pumps is where to pump it ? its easy to say pump it in gulf but on the high tide it will flow back in

and what size of a pump is going to pump water from chayo praya to the sea ? a sufficient drainage mechanism would take years and cost billions to construct

[Thai at Heart]

Hmmmm, i guess there's not enough time to get it to Myth busters....

Well, I guess they are fortunate the kids are on school holiday because it would have taken an average 12 year old high school physics class to work out this one.

[Buchholz]

OMG Please, Please, Please if this is televised please post it .... I have not had this much fun since the pigs ate my little brother....

The motorized bathtubs practically drained the entire river dry.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MLeywAoX19Q

Edited October 12, 2011 by Buchholz

[whybother]

A river flows at a particular speed based on the river's gradient and the volume of the water.

Would a few propellers change that to any measurable degree, or would the water just go back to its normal flow rate after a few metres.

As an extreme example of what might happen, imagine a propeller being used in a bath. The water gets pushed away from the propeller, but it just washes around to fill the space of the water that was pushed out.

Of course, a flowing river is not a bath, but will the space in front of the propeller be filled fast enough by the water coming down the river, or will some of the water being pushed by the propeller just swirl around to be pushed again?

Also, given the size of the river, will the water pushed by a few propellers just slow down to the speed of the normal flow rate within a few metres of the propeller?

Finally, will the possible increased flow by a few fractions of a percent be offset by the water level increase from the displacement of the boats being used to push the water, or the wakes of the boats moving up the river to their positions or even from just sitting in one place?

[Thai at Heart]

A river flows at a particular speed based on the river's gradient and the volume of the water.

Would a few propellers change that to any measurable degree, or would the water just go back to its normal flow rate after a few metres.

As an extreme example of what might happen, imagine a propeller being used in a bath. The water gets pushed away from the propeller, but it just washes around to fill the space of the water that was pushed out.

Of course, a flowing river is not a bath, but will the space in front of the propeller be filled fast enough by the water coming down the river, or will some of the water being pushed by the propeller just swirl around to be pushed again?

Also, given the size of the river, will the water pushed by a few propellers just slow down to the speed of the normal flow rate within a few metres of the propeller?

Finally, will the possible increased flow by a few fractions of a percent be offset by the water level increase from the displacement of the boats being used to push the water, or the wakes of the boats moving up the river to their positions or even from just sitting in one place?

I am not a hydrologist, but I presume you are asking rhetorical questions.

[maidu]

The latter part of the Chao Praya has very little elevation drop, I heard somewhere; about 1 meter per 3 Km. So any amount of pushing water, would be pushing water against water (downstream). Power boats might accelerate a comparative little bit of water on the surface, but it will slow down very soon, as it hits a resistant mass of water ten or fifteen meters further along. The amount of fossil fuel to accelarate water for 15 meters is phenomenal and won't do any good for avoiding flooding - indeed, it will cause wakes to spread, thereby threatening precarious sandbag dikes nearby. Petrol sellers won't mind.

In the bigger picture of things (and I've been espousing this option for ten years on T.Visa and other forums): Move Bangkok to higher ground. Better yet, would be to assign satellite cities. Bkk is going the way of Pompeii - albeit in a watery way. Satellite cities could individually focus on: government/bureaucracy (including the giant Ministry of Inactive Posts), and religion, and universities, and manufacturing. In 20 to 30 years, great swaths of Bkk will have year-round standing water. Why would anyone invest there?

[sjjmmi]

Please lah. Take the boats out of the water and the river will sure flow faster.

OMG Please, Please, Please if this is televised please post it .... I have not had this much fun since the pigs ate my little brother....

The motorized bathtubs practically drained the entire river dry.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MLeywAoX19Q

Edited October 12, 2011 by sjjmmi