Thailand pushes Chao Phraya Dam to peak discharge as flood toll climbs to 24

Thailand's Royal Irrigation Department pushed water releases from the Chao Phraya Dam to their highest approved rate of this year's monsoon season in the early hours of Friday, deepening a flood crisis that has gripped the kingdom's central plains and capital for more than two weeks. The discharge rate reached 2,500 cubic metres per second at 3am local time on October 2, up from roughly 2,300 cubic metres per second a day earlier, as engineers worked to clear a surge of runoff moving south from the upper Chao Phraya basin.

The increase, reported by Khaosod English, triggered fresh warnings for riverside residents in Ayutthaya, Nonthaburi and Pathum Thani to move belongings to higher ground and prepare for possible evacuation. Officials said they were trying to keep the combined flow downstream below 3,000 cubic metres per second by simultaneously trimming releases from the smaller Pa Sak Jolasid Dam.

The dam operation is the latest flashpoint in a flood emergency that began in mid-September, when a stalled monsoon trough dumped record rainfall on northern and central Thailand. Three weeks on, the water has yet to fully drain, and forecasters are warning of another band of heavy rain due in the north and northeast from October 4 to 6, raising fears of a second surge just as the first begins to recede in some provinces.

The scale of the disaster

According to the government's latest nationwide tally, reported by CGTN and Thai outlets, the floods have killed at least 24 people and affected more than 1.1 million households and 3.2 million people across 29 provinces and the capital, Bangkok, since the crisis began on September 16. Roughly 273,600 hectares of farmland remain under water.

• 24 deaths recorded nationwide since mid-September, with the heaviest loss of life in the eastern province of Sa Kaeo
• More than 1.1 million households and over 3.2 million people affected across 29 provinces and Bangkok
• All 50 districts of Bangkok declared a flood disaster area to speed up the official response
• Chao Phraya Dam discharge raised in stages from about 1,300 to 2,500 cubic metres per second since late September

The ASEAN Coordinating Centre for Humanitarian Assistance had already logged a string of smaller flood events in Thailand through August and early September before the current, far larger emergency took hold. Nationwide, reservoirs were sitting at about 79 percent of capacity as of late September, tracked in near-real time on the government's National Hydroinformatics Data Center dashboard, leaving dam operators little room to hold back further inflows.

How the crisis built

The flooding has unfolded in waves rather than a single event. Heavy rain in mid-September first swamped northern provinces before runoff moved into the central plains along the Chao Phraya, Pa Sak and Mae Klong river systems. Officials have repeatedly compared the current emergency with Thailand's catastrophic 2011 floods, which killed more than 700 people, stressing that this year's crisis, while severe, has so far been less deadly and less destructive.

Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul cut short an overseas trip to Japan, the United States and the United Kingdom to return to Bangkok on September 27 as the crisis escalated. He ordered all cabinet ministers to suspend foreign travel, gave provincial governors expanded emergency powers, and directed agencies to use a single, unified set of data when coordinating relief.

"We must work together using a single set of data and put helping the people first, with safety and property as our top priorities," Anutin told officials after returning to Bangkok, according to Khaosod English.

The cabinet subsequently declared September 28 and 29 special public holidays in Bangkok, Nonthaburi, Pathum Thani and Samut Prakan, the four jurisdictions hit hardest by the rising Chao Phraya, in an effort to keep commuters off flooded roads and free up emergency services.

Who is affected

Samut Prakan, on Bangkok's eastern flank, has recorded the largest number of affected households of any single province, with well over 100,000 families reporting flood damage. Ayutthaya, the former royal capital that sits directly downstream of the Chao Phraya Dam, has been repeatedly inundated as discharge rates have climbed, while low-lying Pathum Thani and Nonthaburi, just north of Bangkok, are now the focus of the latest evacuation warnings.

In Bangkok, officials opened more than 230 temporary shelters, concentrated in the city's eastern and northeastern districts. King Maha Vajiralongkorn and Queen Suthida directed the royally sponsored Rajaprachanukroh Foundation to assemble 1,800 relief sets for flood victims housed in three Bangkok shelters, underscoring the political and symbolic weight the monarchy continues to attach to flood relief in a country still shaped by the memory of 2011.

What officials are saying, and what comes next

Government spokesperson Ekkapob Pianpises said this week that the overall water situation "remains manageable" and that no new flood crises had emerged, even as agencies braced for the next band of rain. The Bangkok Metropolitan Administration has deployed additional drainage pumps to speed water out of the capital's canal network, while bus operators have suspended services on several eastern routes cut by standing water.

Anutin has said he will bring a long-discussed Chainat–Pa Sak–Gulf of Thailand water diversion project back to cabinet, arguing that a permanent channel to shunt floodwater around the central plains is the only real fix for a river system that funnels runoff from a third of the country through Bangkok's doorstep every rainy season. For now, the immediate test is whether the dam system can absorb the next round of rain forecast for October 4 to 6 without forcing discharge rates even higher.