Phuket, Thailand News

PHUKET: Alhamdulillah Talk-show Festival, expected to draw over 20,000 participants, is underway in Cherng Talay and will be running until midnight Sunday - rain or shine.

THE secluded Pullman Phuket Arcadia resort in Thailand is offering a 30 percent opening discount when you stay three nights or more.

PHUKET: Business owners' fears of landslides that could be caused by a recently constructed road on a steep hill in the Ao Nang area across the bay from Phuket, led to an investigation on Thursday of the construction site.

Phuket Tourism Association Vice President Bhuritt Maswongssa explains that it is necessary for hotel and resort owners to monitor CCTV to prevent crimes.

Phuket City Police Chief Col Sermphan Sirikong told the Gazette that forensic data is needed to move the case forward.

Any national grid should have enough redundancy built in to enable rerouting of supplies in the event of a maintenance shutdown, a lightning strike, or both.

A massive power failure has affected more than 8 million people in Thailand's 14 southern provinces, including popular tourist areas such as Koh Samui and Phuket, in one of the country's biggest blackouts in recent memory.

Jeremy O'Neill, 37, believed to have been born in Basildon , was holidaying at Phuket, in the southern province of Thailand, when he was apparently swept out to sea at Patong Beach on Tuesday at about 5am.

PHUKET: Two drunk Australians were beaten down by a mob on Phuket's famous party street, Soi Bangla, early yesterday.

Davika Hoorne and Mario Maurer in 'Pee Mak Phrakanong' showing across Phuket. Their love is greater than war and death.

Paitoon Kruain, 32, who operated an illegal taxi picking up tourists at Phuket International Airport, has been charged with sexual assault and is now being held at Phuket Prison.

Pol Maj Gen Roy Inkapairoj, commander of the Tourist Police Division, has plenty of plans and policies to ensure tourist safety.

Business leaders yesterday demanded compensation from authorities for firms affected by Tuesday's massive power outage, while the Energy Ministry ordered a review of the emergency decision-making process.

Tourism officials downplayed the impact of Tuesday night's power outage in the South, but tourism operators and the country's biggest private-sector association expressed fears for their business and demanded the government take steps to ensure that such a situation does not happen again.

Thailand's worst ever power outage is over, says Egat, but worried residents of the South are still anxious after the entire region was left in the dark for two hours last evening.

PHUKET: A major power outage struck across Phuket just before 7pm tonight. Phuket Town, Chalong, Koh Kaew and Thalang are three heavily populated areas suffering from the outage, the Phuket Gazette confirmed.

PHUKET: Police have identified the man whose body washed ashore on Patong Beach early yesterday morning as 37-year-old Jeremy Thomas O'Neill. Because Mr O'Neill's body was found without any identifying documents, police circulated a photo of him to hotels in Patong hoping he would be recognized, Patong Police Deputy Superintendent Akanit ... (more)

PHUKET: A sortie of about 30 illegal taxi drivers from the Mook Andaman co-operative staged an all-night vigil in front of the Governor's Residence last night, finally causing the governor to agree to meet with them today to seek a resolution to their demand to serve passengers at Phuket International Airport.

In April, the Asia/Pacific region's occupancy ended the month with a 0.5-percent decrease to 68.6 percent, its average daily rate dropped 2.3 percent to US$127.20 and its revenue per available room was down 2.8 percent to US$87.22. Hotels in the Asia/Pacific region experienced decreases in the three key performance metrics in April 2013 when ... (more)

The tiny city-state has outperformed its neighbours because it has vision and discipline, precisely the things we lack in fractious, divided Thailand Singapore is a city-state the size of Phuket.