The Bangkok Metropolitan Administration sent ten additional fire trucks and about 30 firefighters to Samut Sakhon province this morning, to help a fight fire in the yard of a scrap paper recycling plant.

The fire started at about 4.30pm on Tuesday and, by the time of this report, the paper is still burning. There are about 26 large piles of scrap paper on 1.76 hectares waiting to be recycled.

About 23 piles, estimated to be worth 180 million baht, have been burned.

At about 9am today, two backhoes were seen digging into piles of scrap paper so firefighters could spray water into the bases of each pile, which are still smouldering.

A fireman reportedly said that they were experiencing a water shortage and they are exhausted after having worked throughout Tuesday night to extinguish the fire.

A pump has been deployed by the Department of Public Disaster Prevention and Mitigation to draw water from a nearby water source.

The Muang district chief officer called an urgent meeting with the district police chief and the manager of the paper recycling company to discuss the best ways to deal with the fire more effectively.

The fire is expected to be completely extinguished three days from when it started.