Bang Fai rocket festival under close watch by Second Army for aviation safety

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Bang Fai rocket festival under close watch by Second Army for aviation safety



BANGKOK: -- As Bang Bang Fai rocket festival starts in several northeastern provinces with highlight of the festival being rocket firing competition, the Second Army is now tightening grip on the firing site and size of the rocket for aviation safety.

It also gives instruction to local authorities to crack down on gambling drastically as now gambling on the rocket will could go up the highest in the sky prevails in all sites where festivals are held.

Action from the Second Army came as the rocket festival which started since April and will end until mid June could pose danger to aviation when the home-made rockets now appeared to be more powerful than previously after betting is involved.

The Second Army realised of the aviation safety during the celebration of the rocket festival in the Northeast, particularly in the provinces where airports are located such as Ubon Ratchathani province.

Some rockets that were launched during the festival had reached 5,000 feet or at the flying altitude of aircraft.

Realising of the powerful rockets used as bet was messed up with the festival when the rocket which goes up to the highest level in the sky will be declared the winner, the Second Army now not only declares zoning for rocket launch site but also limit the size of the home-made rocket so as to prevent it to go up to the safe aviation altitude.

It states that homemade rocket must not exceed 3.5 inches in diameter.

Besides it also bans the launch of rockets in Muang, Warin Chamrab and Don Mod Daeng districts of Ubon Ratchathani province, and in the radius of five kilometres from Ubon Ratchathani international airport for aviation safety.

Ubon Ratchathani airport registers more than 30 flights a day for landing and takeoff.

If no zoning is declared or rocket size is not limited, aviation safety could be threatened by these homemade rockets,

Boun Bang Fai rocket festival is an ancient local festival and is observed in the the country only in the Northeast.

The festival is associated with Thai traditional beliefs in the supernatural powers that help promote the production of rice crops for the coming planting season.

In the rainy season, the local people believe that the god would hear the entreaties that they create a rocket or ‘Bang Fai’ to send to heaven, and bless them with plentiful rain for rice cultivation.

So, the celebration is entirely to the god of rain.

On the festival day, the beautiful rockets in different styles are paraded to the launch site. The local people dress in colorful traditional costumes and dance to accompany the procession. The highlight of the festival is the launch time. The rockets are fired from their launch platforms one by one.

Noisy folk music and cheers can be heard for each liftoff and the rocket that reaches the greatest height is declared the winner. This has attracted gambling in the festival.

Source: http://englishnews.thaipbs.or.th/bang-fai-rocket-festival-under-close-watch-by-second-army-for-aviation-safety


-- Thai PBS 2015-05-11

[Always18]

This "clampdown" has certainly returned more than a little unhappiness to the villages around our parts.......................the volume of gambling, partying and general trading associated with this annual event has to be experienced to be believed!

[Oziex1]

For aviation safety, I'm all for that what about at the international level any progress there?

[seajae]

just make them pay restitution for the houses they burn down and people they kill/injure as well as jail them for it. How stupid is it when they cause destruction and death every year yet continue to do it because, well, its tradition screw the deaths and bugger the houses that are destroyed, we are having fun

[impulse]

Is there one closer to Bangkok? I'd love to watch. (And take my chances)

Meanwhile, back home, they have the same thing, only bigger and higher...and, no doubt, more expensive.

https://ldrs34.org/featured-flights/ Interesting numbers: Mach 2.6, 12,000' altitude and 39' long (not all on the same flight)

Edited May 11, 2015 by impulse

[NongKhaiKid]

just make them pay restitution for the houses they burn down and people they kill/injure as well as jail them for it. How stupid is it when they cause destruction and death every year yet continue to do it because, well, its tradition screw the deaths and bugger the houses that are destroyed, we are having fun

i saw a video years back and sorry can't remember where or supply links where a couple of drunks tried to fire a rocket but only managed to send it horizontally into some spectators. i think the drunks were the worst injured but would be grateful for any correction and clarification.

Can anyone help ?

Edited May 11, 2015 by NongKhaiKid

[Basil B]

surely allow the activity in areas that can be defined as a "no fly zone", i.e. areas well away from flight paths and issue NOTAMs banning all flights in the area.

[impulse]

Say what you want. This looks fun..

https://youtube/pXLiajnu4ts

Edited May 11, 2015 by impulse

[KhaoNiaw]

just make them pay restitution for the houses they burn down and people they kill/injure as well as jail them for it. How stupid is it when they cause destruction and death every year yet continue to do it because, well, its tradition screw the deaths and bugger the houses that are destroyed, we are having fun

They very rarely cause death or destruction. Most villages hold the event at a site in the fields well away from homes. I've been to many of these events and no-one has ever been hurt. It can happen but its pretty rare. The worst thing now is the level of gambling. It's always been part of the fun but it's now become much more organized and the last one I went to even had a gambling tent with the 'bookmaker' flanked by two police officers.

[cloudhopper]

I think they're a blast.

[WitawatWatawit]

I'm waiting for the day when some bright spark of a general sees one of these and has a Eureka moment: "Thailand MUST HAVE an intercontinental ballistic missile!!!!!! Let's build the base for it right now."

[soalbundy]

That's just what they will be doing,watching it all day long.

[quandow]

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just make them pay restitution for the houses they burn down and people they kill/injure as well as jail them for it. How stupid is it when they cause destruction and death every year yet continue to do it because, well, its tradition screw the deaths and bugger the houses that are destroyed, we are having fun alt=blink.png>

YOU, sir, are a degenerate! What you just posted FLIES in the face of "Thainess!" Common sense and decency have NOTHING to do with tradition! Hold your tongue, please!

(just so you know, I sprinkled my keyboard with a WHOLE bunch of sarcasm before I started typing!)

[willyumiii]

I've been a model rocket enthusiast since I was a teen.

These rocket competitions are just one more reason I love living in Thailand!

I say, " if you can't handle a little water over the Songkran holiday..take a brake and go to a place they do not celebrate Songkran.

If you do not like rocket competitions, again, take a brake and go to a place where they don't fly rockets!

This is Thailand.

If you do not like Thailand...take a a brake and go to somewhere that is not Thailand!

Let Thailand be Thailand.

We have no right to change it!

I know Thailand is a popular choice for retirement.

Limited incomes go further here and even plump, wrinkled, grumpy old men can purchase the company of pretty young women here.

But, if you are too old and grumpy to enjoy life and let others enjoy their lives....

Maybe you could have made a better choice of places to retire.

Thai people love to have fun and do not mind taking some risks to have fun.

If you don't.....5, 4, 3, 2, 1,....blast off!..

LOVE IT OR LEAVE IT BABY!

Edited May 11, 2015 by willyumiii

[JAG]

It's very much a North Eastern/Northern Thai thing.

Therefore bound to be viewed by "the powers that be" with extreme suspicion.

If they thought that they could get away with it I expect that they would ban it.

Edited May 11, 2015 by JAG

[bheard]

just make them pay restitution for the houses they burn down and people they kill/injure as well as jail them for it. How stupid is it when they cause destruction and death every year yet continue to do it because, well, its tradition screw the deaths and bugger the houses that are destroyed, we are having fun

i saw a video years back and sorry can't remember where or supply links where a couple of drunks tried to fire a rocket but only managed to send it horizontally into some spectators. i think the drunks were the worst injured but would be grateful for any correction and clarification.

Can anyone help ?

Can't help with your history, but can totally picture these events going very very wrong. Was in Isan last year at this time and it was really scary (for this pathetic farang) with rockets going off randomly during the day for weeks. GF wanted me to go to an event (they happen at intervals in towns all around, I was in the Yasothon area), I flatly refused - too dangerous. She looked at me as it I came from another planet.

[carter1882]

As someone fascinated by Thai culture for more than thirty years. I still believe that the Rocket Festival or Bun Bang Fai of the North East are one of its most fabulous examples. There is the crazy, the traditional, the respectful and the outright dangerous all rolled into one package. I first went to Yasothon in 1998. The following year, in my naivety really, I took a busload of international school kids from. Bangkok. We had a great time and left rather early for the drive to Bangkok. After we left four spectators were killed in the crowd as a rocket went off course. No more school trips though admittedly this was the first accident at Yaso for many years. In later years I took expatriate staff who I figured were more expendable and many said that these trips were the experience of a lifetime. In 2006 at the height of the Taksin regime and with ostentatiousness building wildly a new rocket was set off, bang fai laan, that was a joint collaboration between the PM and the local governor and absolutely huge as the laan or million name implies. It stood on the launching pad for the best part of an hour before it was ignited, lifted off then changed direction and flew just over the heads of a terrified crowd. It crashed into a tyre repair shop attached to a petrol station in downtown Yaso though the shop owner was in the toilet at the time. This event in its raucous form will never be 100% safe but the authorities should limit the size of the rockets, that doesn't spoil its attraction. In my school, that I have now retired from, we used the topic of the Rocket Festival to teach young children the story of Phayathaen, or the god that supplied rain in Thai Culture lessons and I even wrote a play in English to celebrate the story of how the animals, wracked by drought , built a stairway to heaven. I hope the rocket festival will always be a feature of the incredible culture of Isaan and that Bangkok people respect it, visit it and realise what a cultural treasure it is. Just put up some fences and protect the aircraft!!

[FangFerang]

The TAT website does not even list an event in Yasothon, where the big Rocket Festival is held at Phaya Thaen park this year from May 8-12. The festival ran from Friday until today, and today is the day it gets mentioned in the news.

Idiots don't even promote their own events unless it's in Bangkok or Pattaya...

Jerk offs. TAT means That Ain't Thinking...I would have loved to go to this one.