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Published on October 10, 2007

In Phichit province's Sak Lek sub-district, more than 2,000 houses and about 300 shop houses were hit by swirling ater. The inundation also swept through temples, schools and the district's commercial area with floodwater more than a metre deep in the worst-hit spots.

The rising water levels have also left many marooned in the district's villages.

In Phichit's Taphan Hin district, some 1,000 houses were flooded. Residents in its Bang Mun Nak district have also been told to brace for flash floods in the next few days.

In the northern province of Phitsanulok, about 45 families in Tambon Aranyik of Muang Phitsanulok district were struggling with water more than a metre high. "Even the second storeys of their houses are flooded. Since they can't really live at home, we need timber to build temporary shelters," said Kam-pon Panthong, the village head of Moo 10 in Tambon Aranyik.

A team of border patrol police officers yesterday rescued ailing Waew Sukhumnai from her flooded home in Tambon Aranyik.

"She has heart disease and is getting worse. She cannot even walk," said Pol Colonel Preecha Hongjorn, the superintendent of a border-patrol police unit.

Waew, 66, is now at the Buddhachinaraj Hospital.

In Lampang, the flooding has prompted the authorities to declare more than 10 villages in Mae Phrik district as disaster-hit zones. About 1,000 rai of farmland is inundated. In Lampang's Thoen district, many villages were also declared flood-risk areas.

 The Nation