Smog in Pattaya?

[thaibeachlovers]

It looks like Pattaya is covered in smog, but that would be strange as there is a good wind blowing.

I never saw anything like it here before.

It doesn't appear to be rain and isn't raining in my area.

Any ideas?

[morrobay]

The prevailing seasonal (fall/winter) wind from the North started a few days ago. So the air is now coming down from over the land masses instead of the water to South. Also evidenced by the ( wind driven ) swell direction from North of course. And by the way notice all that sand they dumped at North end getting carried away.Wait until the rain stops then you will see some real smog.

[thaibeachlovers]

Lot of thunder in the past 15 minutes, but no rain as of now.

[huahinjoe]

Bangkok is the same, looks like the weather conditions are not the best, visibility low and see everywhere this like the clouds have fallen...

[alocacoc]

19 minutes ago, thaibeachlovers said:

Lot of thunder in the past 15 minutes, but no rain as of now.

 

Yes, now decent rain in Jomtien.

[thaibeachlovers]

Rain just started where I am with lots of thunder. I guess it is just a very low cloud.

Thanks for replies.

[overherebc]

For many of the younger readers who may not know the term SMOG comes from UK in the years when industry and home coal fires were producing lots of smoke which got trapped at lower levels when it was foggy, so 50/50 smoke/fog.

In my opinion very unlikely to get SMOG in Pattaya.

[Simon1287]

Just looked out the window. Yes, I see what you mean. You have never seen it before? How long have you been in Pattaya? It looks like a pretty normal day for much of the early part of the year. This is from a post I made in April:

---------------------------

Pattaya has been pretty bad all year. I bought an air purifier on December 15th which helped a lot but there had hardly been a day since if I look to the distance from where I stay that the air is not hazy. Sometimes really quite badly so. Today is the first day for quite a while, when if I look about a mile to Pratumnak or to the sea, all I detect is a very slight haze.

You don't notice it down at ground level, unless really bad. At one point earlier in the year it got so bad it was showing up in vehicle headlights for a few evenings.

This is the worst year I can remember. 4 months of it so far. Hopefully, it will stop soon but I doubt I shall be here next December to start going through it all again.

Yes, I know it's far worse in some other parts. I won't be going there either. 

No doubt, I will be accused of exaggerating so I have attached a couple of images. 

Neither would be considered anything much out of the ordinary since December last year. Some days better and a few even worse.

Simon 

----------------------------------------

Both photos taken around mid April when it all just suddenly stopped and has been OK ever since, apart from a couple of days, until today.

There is a good post on here somewhere explaining it all.

 

Today looks like a fairly average day from about December to April this year.

 

Really not sure if I want to put up with it again if it is the same again this December.

 

Simon

 

 

[licka]

The smog is caused by burning ALL the used condoms  from massage parlours

[pkspeaker]

I used to see smog in pattaya during the dry season 10 years ago, nothing new.  

[moonseeker]

According to my surgeon & pathologist (Top University Hospital in Europe / lobectomy/lung-removal) I must have lived in a horribly polluted area of the world or been a coalminer for the last 20 years. I am a non-smoker and have lived here for roughly 20 years. Enough said. I have now joined the few wearing a facemask when on the bike, even so it is a bit late.  MS>

[chrisandsu]

You do realise Pattaya sits in between two huge chemical/heavy industrial trading estates ? I'm not surprised the place is polluted at all . 

[johng]

Its rather misty today in Jomtien   I think there is  a phenomenon called  inversion  going on   cold air  higher in the atmosphere traps  the warmer and stagnant air closer to the ground.

[morrobay]

1 hour ago, johng said:

Its rather misty today in Jomtien   I think there is  a phenomenon called  inversion  going on   cold air  higher in the atmosphere traps  the warmer and stagnant air closer to the ground.

 

No just the opposite : In your scenario the warm air would rise up through the cold  air since it is less dense.

An inversion layer that would trap air air near the ground would have the cooler layer below the warmer layer.

Its all about my first post : The air is now coming down here from the land masses to the North because of seasonal

wind direction recent change. 

[johng]

12 minutes ago, morrobay said:

No just the opposite

 

Yes your are correct   my understanding of an inversion... was inverted   

 

Quote

In meteorology, an inversion is a deviation from the normal change of an atmospheric property with altitude. It almost always refers to a "temperature inversion", i.e. an increase in temperature with height, or to the layer ("inversion layer") within which such an increase occurs.^[1]

An inversion can lead to pollution such as smog being trapped close to the ground, with possible adverse effects on health. An inversion can also suppress convection by acting as a "cap". If this cap is broken for any of several reasons, convection of any moisture present can then erupt into violent thunderstorms. Temperature inversion can notoriously result in freezing rain in cold climates.

 

[YaiJung]

It is smog.  Just look at the AQI - at the moment 132 in chonburi, yesterday in the 140s before the rain came. 

 

http://aqicn.org/city/thailand/chonburi/laem-chabang-municipal-stadium/

[KhunBENQ]

23 hours ago, overherebc said:

For many of the younger readers who may not know the term SMOG comes from UK in the years when industry and home coal fires were producing lots of smoke which got trapped at lower levels when it was foggy, so 50/50 smoke/fog.

In my opinion very unlikely to get SMOG in Pattaya.

SMOG : smoke + fog

Some seem never have heard about fog nor haze?

Sure there is smoke in Pattaya but not prevelant all over the area!

Funny thread.

It's the rainy season. The air might be very humid after the rains.

There is an ocean bay, air temperature can drop now, water temperature unchanged (warm).

What happens? You can try it in the bathroom when you live in a cold area, just open the window

 

Here in the northeast we had some pretty dense morning fog which disperses quickly.

 

For our younger readers

Pictures from my place taken on Oct 4 this year.

 

Fog:

And that fog becomes haze:

 

Absolutely NO SMOG.

 

 

[johng]

There used to be a pollution monitoring truck parked on  the very busy second road  near to Mike Shopping mall

the results always showed as very good / good  for that monitoring station   

[KhunBENQ]

BTW

I am only an occasional visitor to Pattaya but completely clear skys (no haze, seeing the islands clearly) is more an exception than the rule.

Depends on the season of course.

At this time of year I would not expect clear sky.

Nothing unusual.

[thaibeachlovers]

I thought it might be smog because it was brownish, and not grey like overcast.

I used to live in Pattaya, but didn't have a view. Now I do.

 

Thanks for replies. Interesting.

[overherebc]

2 minutes ago, KhunBENQ said:

SMOG : smoke + fog

Some seem never have heard about fog nor haze?

Sure there is smoke in Pattaya but not prevelant all over the area!

Funny thread.

It the rainy season. The air might be very humid after the rains.

There is an ocean bay, air temperature drops, water temperature unchanged (warm).

What happens? You can try it in the bathroom

Here in the northeast we had some pretty dense morning fog which disperses quickly.

 

For our younger readers

Pictures from my place.

 

Fog:

And that fog becomes haze:

 

Absolutely NO SMOG.

 

 

 

Another effect you get living near the coast in many places is a total wind change direction at the end of the day caused by the land/sea temperature difference.

Daytime the land warms faster than the sea causing the air above it to rise and it's replaced by cooler air coming in from the sea. Around start of the evening you will notice that many times the wind will drop as the land and sea temperatures even out. A little bit later the wind will start again in the opposite direction ie going out to sea.

It does depend a bit on not being in the middle of fast changing weather conditions and local geography/topography etc. At different times it can cause sea fog/mist and land fog/mist near the coast.

[overherebc]

Ok I want to claim the following

after SMOG.

Re my last post on sea fog/mist I will call it     FOST.

 

Thank you.

[bkk6060]

I come from California it is not smog.  It will rain here for a day and be perfectly clear, then the next morning you get that haze.  We are near the ocean/beach, very normal weather.  The air here is much cleaner then California I believe.

[chas39]

According to the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office Pattaya not just misty, but doesn't exist. Their wishful thinking :-) 

[chrisandsu]

 

9 hours ago, chas39 said:

According to the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office Pattaya not just misty, but doesn't exist. Their wishful thinking :-) 

Had to quote it three times just to see if I had read right ! You do realise this is a map of the provinces ?

[chas39]

It shows where Pattaya is - but south along the coast south of Chonburi, it doesn't show Pattaya. It was a joke about the FCO wanting to airbrush Pattaya. It was a joke...never mind.

In case you look again, I also realise that southern Thailand isn't shown by me. Though it was on the original.

[LennyW]

It's fog.

[wpcoe]

18 hours ago, chas39 said:

According to the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office Pattaya not just misty, but doesn't exist. Their wishful thinking :-) 

 

Kind of fruitless posting that graphic here when the forum software is currently showing everything in greyscale and apparently the graphic uses color coding to indicate different areas.  Do you have a link to the original source where we can view it in full color?

[chas39]

https://www.gov.uk/foreign-travel-advice/thailand

[wpcoe]

17 hours ago, chas39 said:

https://www.gov.uk/foreign-travel-advice/thailand

 

Thanks.  I didn't properly catch the intent of posting the image.  I had assumed it would show the areas of smog/pollution, but missed that you were simply trying to show that Pattaya was lacking from a UK official government map.  Sorry!

 

(BTW, Hua Hin is also missing from the map.)