Thailand shifts gear in flood evacuation; Indonesia death toll climbs to 61

By Thomas Suen and Mandy Leong

HAT YAI, Thailand/KUALA PERLIS, Malaysia, Nov 27 (Reuters) - Flood rescue teams in Thailand readied drones to deliver aid and helicopters dropped supplies to people marooned on rooftops on Thursday, as the death toll from its worst floods in years rose and the number killed by a cyclone in Indonesia climbed to 61.

Thailand's government said 55 people died during severe floods from a week of heavy rain that has devastated nine southern provinces, while on the Indonesian island of Sumatra, rescue teams battled to reach communities cut off by landslides and floods that wreaked chaos in three provinces.

Thailand has pushed relief efforts into high gear after the military brought in an aircraft carrier, 20 helicopters and convoys of trucks to deliver food, medicine and dinghies, and issued a public appeal for boats and jet skis to reach people stranded for days by waters up to 2 metres (7 feet) high.

Floodwaters had receded on Thursday in Thailand's worst-hit city of Hat Yai and authorities were optimistic that access could increase and allow basic services to be restored.

"Efforts to assist the public are continuing, but the flooding situation will be a long fight," Thai government spokesperson Siripong Angkasakulkiat said.

Nearly 3 million people have been affected by floods in southern Thailand, with thousands of people huddling in evacuation centres, while in neighbouring Malaysia, similar flooding in seven states killed two people and forced more than 34,000 into shelters.

TROPICAL CYCLONE DEVASTATES INDONESIAN ISLAND

On Sumatra, an Indonesian island of 60 million people, a tropical cyclone unleashed deadly floods and landslides, with at least 100 people missing and power outages and damaged infrastructure hampering rescue efforts.

Kompas TV showed images of earth sliding down a hillside to pile up in front of homes, while gushing waters higher than 1 metre (3.5 feet) swept along debris and the branches of trees.

People were carried out of their homes through fast-flowing water and helped onto orange rubber boats in the teeming rain, video from the search and rescue agency showed.

Verified images from West Sumatra showed rescue teams carrying bodies through deep mud and cars displaced and on top of each other after being carried away by a tide of floodwater.

Meteorologists say current extremes of weather in Southeast Asia could stem from the interaction of two active systems, Typhoon Koto in the Philippines and the unusual formation of Cyclone Senyar in the Malacca Strait.

Global warming can bring more frequent extreme events as higher sea surface temperatures supercharge tropical storms.

The most recent floods follow a series of deadly typhoons and heavy monsoon rains that have lashed the Philippines and Vietnam and swelled floods elsewhere.

ARMY REINFORCEMENTS ARRIVE

Thailand's army engineering corps with specialist vehicles and 2,000 members of the civil defence corps arrived on Thursday in Hat Yai, the fifth-largest city, where helicopters were delivering food to hospitals and victims still stuck on rooftops.

In Hat Yai, thousands have been stranded by the heaviest rainfall in 15 years, with 335 mm (13 inches) recorded on Friday, the city's highest in a single day for 300 years.

Aerial footage under grey skies over Hat Yai showed miles of roads engulfed by brown water, with heavy-duty trucks crawling along wide thoroughfares past abandoned cars and lorries, as groups of people waded slowly through knee-deep water.

"I'm walking back to my grandmother because she hadn’t had food for two or three days. I heard she finally received some food, but I’m still worried," said Natawat Chermmontri, 18, moments before diving into the water to swim across a road.

TROPICAL STORM WARNING

Waters were receding in Malaysia, where authorities issued new warnings on Thursday of a tropical storm until the weekend that could bring strong winds, rough seas and heavy, continuous rain affecting seven states.

Container lorries were used to bring some Malaysians back over the border from Thailand, the foreign minister said, as smaller vehicles were unable to traverse the floodwaters. Authorities said about 500 nationals were still stranded in Hat Yai, a city popular with Malaysian tourists.

At an evacuation centre in the state of Perlis, Gon Qasim said rising waters trapped her in her home in the middle of a paddy field.

"The water was like the ocean," the 73-year-old said.

In Thailand, police said they were assisting 1,000 stranded foreigners, moving them to shelters at a university.

At an indoor basketball arena that was turned into an evacuation centre, a tearful Kritchawat Sothiananthakul, 70, described the inexorable rise of waters in his Hat Yai home, as he waited with his dog to be rescued.

"We had to climb down from the roof, get into the boat," he said. "I needed to carry it and then get onto a truck... We had to leave everything because everything was submerged."