Troops from barracks in Mae Hong Son province, with food, medicine and drinking water, were sent to a remote village in Khun Yuam district this morning, to help about 400 people left marooned by a flash flood and mudslide last night.
One elderly woman remains missing and is believed to have drowned after being washed away by strong currents. 40 students from a school in Mae Kopee village were evacuated to a nearby mountainside when a flash flood hit yesterday. All of them have now been brought back home, as the floodwater has receded.
The village is covered with thick mud, tree trunks and other debris from a mud slide, making it only accessible on foot.
Thana Katathikarnmongkol, a member of the Mae Yuam Noi Tambon Administrative Organisation (TAO), said that the Mae Kopee villagers are badly in need of food and drinking water.
In Mae Sai district of Chiang Rai province, overflows from the Sai River have been pouring into the Sai Lom Joy border market since last night, but shopkeepers had already moved their goods to higher ground before the inundation.
Many riverside houses and hectares of farmland are also flooded.
Today, the National Water Resources Office warned of flash foods, mudslides and overflows in several districts in 23 northern, north-eastern and eastern provinces from Friday until next Thursday, due to a moderate monsoon trough over the northern region and northern Laos and a low pressure cell over northern Vietnam.
