PUBLISHED : 29 Mar 2025 at 19:44
WRITER: Post Reporters
The short message service (SMS) alerts warning people about Friday’s earthquake in Myanmar should have been sent out more promptly to everyone and should have provided more useful information relevant to such an emergency, Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra said on Saturday.
She was speaking at a meeting with state agencies involved in the government’s response to the aftermath of the 7.7-magnitude quake. The meeting was held at the Department of Disaster Prevention and Mitigation (DDPM) in Bangkok.
Shortly after the quake struck at 1.20pm on Friday, the most urgent information people needed was confirmation of what had happened, what actions they should take next, and where to go for safety, the prime minister said.
In response, Passakorn Boonyalak, director-general of the DDPM, stated that his agency had sent the first text message to the National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission (NBTC) for dissemination at 2.42pm. The message informed recipients that it was safe to return to buildings to collect their belongings.
Trairat Wiriyasirikul, acting secretary-general of the NBTC, told the prime minster that the message was broadcast at 2.44pm to about 10 million mobile phone numbers, in batches of 200,000 at a time, across Bangkok and three surrounding provinces.
The same message was later resent to recipients in all 76 provinces, he added.
“The problem is that it took far too long for these text messages to reach people, not everyone received them, and the information provided was not particularly useful,” the premier said.
She instructed both agencies to find a way to overcome the technical limitation that currently restricts each broadcast to a maximum of 200,000 recipients at a time. She urged them to increase this capacity to 1 million recipients per broadcast while awaiting the full implementation of the NBTC’s cell broadcast technology, expected between June and July.
Another key issue requiring attention was whether foreign nationals using SIM cards registered in Thailand should also receive earthquake alerts in English, she said.
The NBTC and DDPM needed to work more closely to resolve these issues and report back to her, as the public deserved an explanation as to why the emergency alerts were not sent promptly — despite her having ordered the agencies to issue them at around 2pm on Friday.
The state-run NBT TV channel was able to broadcast an emergency update within five minutes of receiving her directive, she noted.
All rail transport services — except for the Yellow and Pink monorail lines — resumed operations yesterday after being promptly suspended following Friday’s quake, said Chayatan Phromsorn, permanent secretary for transport.
The Yellow and Pink lines required an additional day for safety inspections, he said.
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