Raw Sewage Leaves Phuket Residents Retching

[Lite Beer]

Raw sewage leaves Phuket residents retching
Phuket Gazette -

PHUKET: Polluted water with a stench so overpowering it is making people physically ill has become the bane of residents along the banks of the Bang Yai Canal in Phuket Town.

“People vomit and get serious headaches,” said Samkong resident Lek Bumrung.

“Dirty water is released into the canal at odd intervals, day or night,” she said. “But each time it happens, the stench gets stronger.”

“Untreated wastewater is being dumped into the sewers in Rassada, just before Samkong, then it travels through the sewage system to the main treatment plant at Saphan Hin, where it is treated before being released into the sea,” said Phuket City Municipality Chief Administrative Officer Thawatchai Thongmang.

“We contacted Rassada Municipality, asking them to stop the release of untreated wastewater into the system, but we have yet to receive any response,” he said.

The water in Bang Yai canal has been tested and some of the results were off the scale.

The average biological oxygen demand (BOD), a key indicator of water quality, measured 54. The BOD standard average is about 34, said Chakkrit Songsaeng, Phuket City Wastewater Treatment Chief, who tested the water in the canal where it flows under Yaowarat Bridge in Samkong (map here).

The suspended solids (SS) average weighed in at 44, nearly double the accepted average of 24 and exactly double the industry standard of 22.

But it was the grease and oil (“G&O”) reading that outstripped all other pollutant readings of the Phuket Town canal.

Bang Yai Canal in Samkong oozed a reading of 19.6. The average is about 0.4, Mr Chakkrit said.

While local residents suspect the culprits are industrial factories upstream, Mr Chakkrit points the finger at the slew of new communities that have sprung up along the canal in Rassada in recent years, namely along Soi Paniang just north of Samkong.

To this, Rassada Municipality Chief Administrative Officer Dechakanee Leelanont said that his community was not to blame.

“I assure you the dirty water in Bang Yai Canal is not us,” he said.

“Also, we have not received any request from Phuket City Municipality asking us to stop releasing untreated wastewater into the canal,” he added.

An officer at Rassada Municipality’s Public Health and Environment Department, speaking anonymously, agreed with Mr Chakkrit, saying that the likely culprit was the hundreds of houses that had been built along Soi Paniang in recent years – many without septic tanks installed.

The officer also verified it was not industrial activities along the canal that were polluting the water.

“Almost all factories in Rassada have installed tanks to treat their wastewater before releasing it into the canal, but there are some communities along Soi Paniang that still have not installed septic tanks. That is affecting the water quality,” the officer said.

Jarun Nongsook, an engineer at the Phuket Provincial Industrial office, agreed. “The dirty water affecting Samkong residents is from raw sewage from the Soi Paniang area being emptied into the canal… It is not from the private factories in the area,” he said.

Mr Jarun explained that water-quality tests had found the bankside factories free of blame.

“The BOD average was 9.8, compared with the standard average of 20. Also, the suspended solids average was 9.6, compared with the standard average of 30,” Mr Jarun said.

“The pH average of the water was 6.73 and the G&O average was 4.8, all within the normal parameters,” he said.

“The water the factories release into the canal is clean,” he said.

Meanwhile, Phuket City Wastewater Treatment Chief Chakkrit is already considering installing wastewater treatment plants to ensure the canal’s water quality remains at safe levels.

However, the project is likely to cost upwards of 60 million baht. “We are aware of the problem and we are trying everything we can to solve it. We expect our project to be approved so we can resolve this issue to help local residents,” Mr Chakkrit said.

Source: http://www.phuketgazette.net/phuket_news/2013/Raw-sewage-leaves-Phuket-residents-retching-20844.html

-- Phuket Gazette 2013-04-20

[Shot]

This has got to be one of the funniest things I have read recently. It looks like a script from Hay Ha.

[NomadJoe]

They need to come test the klong in Kata as well as the water near where it enters the ocean on the north end of the beach. Rumor is the klongs processing plant on Kata Rd. hasn't worked for 3 years. It will often smell like a mix of unine and dirty dish water. No wonder the reefs are dying. Organic growth with no planning.

[LivinginKata]

Processing plant on Kata Road ? - are you talking about Club Med's plant. I did not know there was a public sewage filter plant in Kata.

[Lite Beer]

Phuket Opinion: Seeing through the muck
Phuket Gazette -

Local authorities need to step forward and stop the sickening waste from flowing into Bang Yai Canal. Image: Gazette Graphics

PHUKET: Pollution levels in the Bang Yai Canal strong enough to make residents of Phuket Town’s Samkong area physically ill should spur authorities in all relevant jurisdictions to work together to pinpoint the source of the contaminants and punish any violators.

Unfortunately, the official response on all sides has been the opposite. Some local officials are firing off knee-jerk denials, claiming that the source of the contaminants are not in their areas of control, while others are using this tragedy as an excuse to call for additional funding for expensive new water treatment plants.

Reports of unacceptably high pollution levels in Klong Bang Yai in Phuket Town are certainly nothing new. In August 2011, residents in the area where the canal passes Satree Phuket School were seen collecting hundreds of dead fish killed in a mysterious “mass poisoning”. The cause was never thoroughly investigated, let alone explained, by authorities.

Even in Kata, once considered one of the island’s untainted tourism jewels, poorly regulated development and the recent lack of rainfall have turned the canal near the south end of the beach into little more than a fetid open sewer. Similar manifestations of the local population's collective contempt for the environment that sustains us can be found all over the island, and even on the remains of broken coral reefs off our shores.

Of course the case of Klong Bang Yai long predates Phuket’s emergence as one of Asia’s premier resort island destinations. The canal and its many tributaries were vital components of the vast tin mining industry that radically transformed the natural topography into what we see today. In fact, most of the island’s water supply is collected in abandoned tin-mining ponds, while the entire shoreline along Phuket Bay, including all of Saphan Hin, was created by tin mine tailings that have left the bay’s once sandy bottom now covered in several meters of muck.

Klong Bang Yai drains much of Rassada, Phuket Town and virtually all of Kathu into the sea at Saphan Hin, which is also home to the landfill and incineration plant that is the final destination of all the island’s solid waste. Rather than use this latest tragedy to seek funding, it is time each and every local administration body in the Bang Yai catchment area take responsibility for enforcing pollution control laws and punishing violators under their jurisdictions, rather than continuing to view the waterway as an open sewer.

Sadly, in many cases this responsibility falls to the same individuals who rubber stamp Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) studies in exchange for payoffs, and who are probably hoping now that the monsoon rains will arrive in full, diluting the end result of their ineptitude and greed, carrying all the waste out to sea as public attention turns to more immediate issues such as flooding and landslides.

Source: http://www.phuketgazette.net/phuket_news/2013/Phuket-Opinion-Seeing-through-the-muck-20821.html

-- Phuket Gazette 2013-04-21

[Unkomoncents]

Phuket gets better by the day......ought to just call it F-U-K-E-T, Delhi style...

[Kudzu]

They need to come test the klong in Kata as well as the water near where it enters the ocean on the north end of the beach. Rumor is the klongs processing plant on Kata Rd. hasn't worked for 3 years. It will often smell like a mix of unine and dirty dish water. No wonder the reefs are dying. Organic growth with no planning.

Agree. I saw some constructions works there, so probably after 6 months them will take care of this, also will be nice to get back this dock for boats.

[kevvy]

What a load of shit

[Jimi007]

Phuket gets better by the day......ought to just call it F-U-K-E-T, Delhi style...

Oh come on. If you're going to use phonetics, it's called Poo-ket... By all means please don't come here and add to the garbage and pollution problem...

[cup-O-coffee]

Wasn't there a story similar to this a while ago where a village elder complained and ended up dead?

[Joe Mamma]

It gives the meaning of a shitty deal. I just thought the prices and vibe there were the shits.

[NomadJoe]

Processing plant on Kata Road ? - are you talking about Club Med's plant. I did not know there was a public sewage filter plant in Kata.

There was an ongoing story about this a couple years ago when a foreign team of experts and a foreign film crew was doing an expose' on it. There is a treatment plant there and one at the other end too I think, which according to one of the reports doesn't work when there is either too much rain or a power cut which will then cause raw sewage (not "grey water") to flow directly past tourists on the beach and into the sea. There was even a "biohazard" placard placed on the flap on the outflow pipe next to Kata Beach Resort. I can't seem to find any of the stories on it now though.

So you are saying this is the Club med plant?

Edited April 22, 2013 by NomadJoe

[Soupdragon]

^^^This story ??

http://www.phuketgazette.net/archives/articles/2011/article10407.html

[vijer]

As I have said before, Thai's don't know how to treat sewage. 70 million people, plus 12 million visitors and yet there isn't a sewage treatment plant anywhere in Thailand. Thai's think sewage treatment is putting in a a holding tank to hold the solids, until they liquify, and letting the liquid run into the sewer which then ends up in the canal.

[LivinginKata]

Processing plant on Kata Road ? - are you talking about Club Med's plant. I did not know there was a public sewage filter plant in Kata.

There was an ongoing story about this a couple years ago when a foreign team of experts and a foreign film crew was doing an expose' on it. There is a treatment plant there and one at the other end too I think, which according to one of the reports doesn't work when there is either too much rain or a power cut which will then cause raw sewage (not "grey water") to flow directly past tourists on the beach and into the sea. There was even a "biohazard" placard placed on the flap on the outflow pipe next to Kata Beach Resort. I can't seem to find any of the stories on it now though.

So you are saying this is the Club med plant?

To be honest I was thinking about club med's water treatment plant to the south of the klong (very bottom of your map) where there is a wooden gate leading into the plant. I had no idea at all about that treatment plant you show. Just took a google walk along the road and there is only a small unmarked entrance. I had always assumed all this land was owned by Club Med as it appeared undeveloped. As you know Club Med bought a large swath of land along the beach front many many years ago.

[NamKangMan]

As I have said before, Thai's don't know how to treat sewage. 70 million people, plus 12 million visitors and yet there isn't a sewage treatment plant anywhere in Thailand. Thai's think sewage treatment is putting in a a holding tank to hold the solids, until they liquify, and letting the liquid run into the sewer which then ends up in the canal.

"there isn't a sewage treatment plant anywhere in Thailand" - Phuket is surrounded by a huge sewage treatment plant - it's called, the ocean. :)