Phuket Governor Sophon Suwannarat chaired the meeting at Provincial Hall where he was joined by relevant government officials and the delegation from Japan.
The initiative, which is fully supported by the Japanese government, seeks to support measures to enhance overall public safety by managing and minimising potential natural disaster threats, such as land movements including earthquakes, landslides and tsunamis.
One key such measure is through the deployment of a robust EWS, something Japan has been diligent in developing for many years, given the country’s susceptibility to regular land tremors that have led to devastating earthquakes and subsequent tsunamis in recent years.
The commitment to such such collabration was confirmed at the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC COP 27), which took place in November 2022 in Egypt.
A key component of the project was the Ministry of the Environment of Japan conducting surveys in several countries last year. It has selected Thailand for specific study and collaboration due to its belief that the country has high potential to promote and introduce EWS management and effective AI applications. One such initiative is ‘Spectee Pro’, a program that uses AI to obtain and process accurate and precise analysis results that can calculate and notify in advance of disasters, collect data from social media in real time, and help filter data to obtain accurate information. The data can be forwarded directly to the agency quickly and accurately.
Part of Thailand’s tsunami EWS covers six provinces along the Andaman coast, namely Satun, Trang, Krabi, Phang Nga, Ranong and Phuket and uses a series of buoys that collect data when an earthquake with a tsunami potential strikes.
On such buoy, Station 23461, located 340 kilometres northwest of Phuket, stopped sending signals at the start of this year, according to the Foundation of National Disaster Warning Council, although it was later confirmed that this posed no danger to the overall operating system.
In July 2022 a series of underwater earthquakes off the Andaman and Nicobar Islands prompted local disaster officials to conduct a full review of Phuket’s tsunami-warning system and carry out two evacuation drills to test the readiness of local officials to quickly evacuate risk areas in case the need arises.