ELEVEN people drowned, two others were injured and two people are missing due to flooding in the South over the past four days, Chatchai Promlert, director-general of the Disaster Prevention and Mitigation Department said yesterday.

He said the floods affected 157,580 families in 68 districts in the 10 southern provinces of Chumphon, Surat Thani, Nakhon Si Thammarat, Krabi, Trang, Phatthalung, Songkhla, Yala, Pattani, and Narathiwat.

Chatchai said two had died in Surat Thani, three in Nakhon Si Thammarat, two in Songkhla, two in Phatthalung, and two in Pattani.

Meanwhile, Government Spokesman Lt-General Sansern Kaewkamnerd said Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha was monitoring the flooding situation in the South closely and the prime minister had ordered local government agencies to coordinate efforts to help flood victims with utmost efficiency.

For example, Sansern said, Prayut wanted the disaster mitigation centre of the Fourth Army Area to coordinate with the Southern Disaster Mitigation Centre of the Interior Ministry to work with provincial disaster mitigation centres to rush help to the people affected by floods. Sansern said the agencies were ordered to place fast-moving aid units on standby around the clock to help flood victims.

Also yesterday, Nakhon Si Thammarat Governor Chamroen Tipyapongthada reported the flood situation in his province, saying the flooding so far had affected 1,245 villages in 18 districts. Because of the ongoing flooding, four train routes to Trang and Nakhon Si Thammarat provinces had to stop at Thung Song district in Nakhon Si Thammarat yesterday instead of going to their destinations, an official of the State Railway of Thailand in Thung Song said.

Chaiya Katcharat, the SRT official, said SRT workers had yet to check the flooded tracks to see whether they had been damaged. Chaiya said the SRT provided buses to transport the passengers to their destinations.

In Surat Thani, Governor Uaychai Innak said the floods had affected 18,117 families in 421 villages in 14 districts.

In Songkhla province, the provincial disaster mitigation office reported that two five-year-old girls had drowned in the province because of floods that hit six districts – Muang, Hat Yai, Na Mom, Saba Yoi, Sadao and Ranot. The office said the flood situation had started to improve after rains stopped and the bloated rivers had subsided to normal levels.

In Trang, some 20,000 people in seven districts had been hit by floods, the provincial disaster mitigation office said. It added that the floods had damaged some 15,000 rai (2,400 hectares) of farmland in the districts of Rassada, Huay Yot, Wang Wise, Na Yong, Yan Ta Khao, Muang and Palian.

In Nayong, a mudslide blocked a main village road, prompting officials to use a bulldozer to clear it.

Also yesterday, troops from the Phraya Rassadanupradit fort handed out bags of food and other necessities to villagers in Moo 4 village in Tambon Lamphura in Huay Yot. Villagers had to wade through chest-high water to receive the help.