August 2005 116th Issue

Her Majesty The Queen's Birthday and National Mother's Day

Her Majesty Queen Sirikit of Thailand 's birthday on 12 August is a nationwide public holiday, celebrated in the whole Thai Kingdom as Mother's Day. On this day, public buildings throughout Thailand are decorated with her portrait and garlanded with flowers and many coloured lights. All around the country the Thai people, businesses and local organizations raise flags and portraits of Her Majesty Queen Sirikit.

Her Majesty Queen Sirikit of Thailand was born on 12 August 1932 as the eldest daughter of His Highness Prince Chandaburi Suranath and Mom Luang Bua Kitiyakara Snidwongse. The name “Sirikit” was given to her by King Prajadhipok or King Rama VII.

Mon Rajawongse Sirikit attended kindergarten at the Rajini School in Bangkok and later on went to the Saint Francis Xavier convent school in Bangkok . At the end of World War II, when her father was appointed as Ambassador to France , later on to Denmark and finally as full Ambassador to Great Britain , Mon Rajawongse Sirikit continued her education in those three European countries to finally complete her education at the “Riante Rive boarding school” in Lausanne Switzerland .

Thailand 's Queen Sirikit is perhaps best known for her efforts in reviving many of Thailand 's ancient arts and crafts. The Queen's support foundation “Foundation for the Promotion of Supplementary Occupations and Related Techniques” has expanded progressively since its establishment in 1976 to include craft shops in many of Thailand's cities and tourist areas, and 2 Thai Folk Arts and Crafts Training Centers at Chitralada Villa and at in Bangsai, Ayutthaya.

As a National Tribute to the Thai Queen's boundless contributions for the entire Thai population and especially the underprivileged in Thailand , 12 August has been declared the Nation's National Mothers Day and a public holiday.

The owners and staff at the Observer would like to join all the people of Thailand in wishing Her Majesty Queen Sirikit a very joyous happy birthday on 12 August.

HUA HIN REGATTA 2005

The Yacht Racing Association of Thailand is hosting the sixth annual Hua Hin Regatta between 3 rd and 7 th August.

The venue for the event is at the Hua Hin Naval Yacht Club , on Naebkehardt Road . During the day of the third of August registrations will take place for competitors. The racing actually starts at 1 pm on the Fourth of August when a practice race with be held.

The entry fee for competitors is US$50 per person, and boats can be chartered on a first come first served basis for US$50 up to US$400 depending on the class.

All are welcome to come and watch the fun.

For more information email sail@yrat.or.th

Gone Fishin'

Just imagine – you have gone for a pleasant afternoon's fishing at your local river. You get a few nibbles but nothing very much. Still you are enjoying the afternoon sun, and being ‘at one' with nature (plus a ready supply of cold beers). Then you get something big. Really BIG. You call in a couple of other fishermen to help you, then a couple more. You are beginning to think you have got a shark on the line! Eventually the local working fishermen come to your aid with nets and boats. And you pull in the monster shown below – a 293 kilogram, 2.7 metre catfish, or in old money, 646 pounds and nearly nine feet long. The size of a Grizzly Bear!

That isn't quite how it happened, but Thai fishermen in Chiang Khong in northern Thailand caught this monster on 1st May this year, and it is officially the largest freshwater fish ever landed. As you can imagine from the photograph, these two fishermen were practising their ‘it was this big!' story for their mates. Thai Fisheries officials urged the fishermen to release the fish, and they were going to but unfortunately it died before they could. The reason for the need to put it back is that the Mekong giant catfish is a critically endangered species, it's numbers believed to have fallen by 80% over the last 13 years. The last time one had been caught in Thailand before this was 2001, and numbers have been dwindling in all parts of the Mekong River .

The name of the fish in Thai is Pla Buek, and it is believed that the dwindling numbers is due to three main threats - commercial fishing, their touting to tourists as a food said to impart wisdom, and dynamite blasting of their spawning ground. The blasting project is part of navigation channel improvements planned by the governments of China , Burma , Thailand , and Lao People's Democratic Republic. It is also believed that various dam projects and other environmental damage up and down the Mekong .

There is an ongoing conservation project (the Mekong Fish Conservation Project), now based in Cambodia, to tag and collate information on the species, as well as other migratory fish in the Mekong River Basin, and they have enlisted the fishermen to assist them, who now get paid to catch the fish, call the project and then help release the fish upstream for spawning, instead of selling them for food. They also get paid a small sum for any tags they recover from recaptured fish, as this helps in determining how quickly the numbers are dropping, as well as the movements of the fish.

In 2004, Her Majesty The Queen made the plight of the Mekong giant catfish an issue when she advised the Thai Department of Fisheries on the revival of indigenous Thai fish, and as part of that project 7,200 of various species were released (after being bred in fish ponds) on 17th June 2004 in celebration of Her Majesty The Queen's 72nd birthday. The Mekong giant catfish is commonly also referred to as the ‘Royal Fish', and moves have been made to make it the official fish of Thailand .

IN MEMORIAM

We are very sorry to publish the news that Mr. Håkan Skollund, better known to his friends as “The Shrimp” has passed away in San Paulo Hospital at the young age of 47.

This very popular Swedish man will be missed by all his Thai and expat friends.

For further information please call Jaw Hoffman on 0707 58278.

Asian news and current affairs

Wrangle Over US Wreck

By Martin Young

HUA HIN, Thailand - Since the discovery in May of the World War II wreck of the USS Lagarto, a 1,500 ton Balao class submarine, in the Gulf of Thailand, a new skirmish on and under the seas is surfacing.

On one side are the divers who discovered the wreck and who are eager to explore and film it. On the other side is the might of the US military, which insists that the wreck should be left untouched out of respect for the 86 crewmen who went down with her.

For 60 years the Lagarto rested untouched on the seabed in 70 meters of water about 150 kilometers off the southeast coast of Thailand . Local dive operators on the tiny resort island of Koh Tao knew of the submarine's fate, but couldn't pinpoint her location until recently.

“We've always known that since the end of the war there's been a submarine missing around there,” said British wreck diver Jamie MacLeod, who discovered the 110-meter submarine. “We went into all the war-time records, cross-referenced them with fishermen's marks and then searched with sonar and it came up trumps - we found a bump on the bottom, went down the line and there it was.”

MacLeod said, “It looks to me like it's intact and it's sitting upright on the bottom in very clear water, so you can get a good idea of what it looks like. Everything is still on it - all the armaments, the brass navigation lights. It's beautiful.”

The waters around Thailand are the final resting place for many warships that battled for domination of the oceans during World War II. Several well-known wrecks further north in the gulf are popular with recreational and technical divers.

At the time of discovery of the Lagarto, US officials unequivocally denied permission to local dive shop owners to dive the wreck, fearing that it would turn into a tourist attraction. A US Embassy spokesperson said the divers would never get permission to study the submarine because it belonged to the US Navy under international maritime law and was the final resting place for the people who went down with it.

Jeff Davis, spokesman for the US Pacific Fleet Submarine Force in Pearl Harbor , Hawaii , said the vessel discovered in May “is in the area where we suspected the Lagarto was”. The Lagarto was one of 52 submarines that sank in the Pacific during World War II, he said. There are no plans to raise the vessel.

The term war grave was used to discourage further diving to the site. MacLeod has been sympathetic, recently saying, “It's nice because now the families are talking about closure,” but he has maintained his position to seek official permission to dive the sub and has even gone to lengths to bring some of the Lagarto grandchildren to the site after contacting relatives of the crew through the US Submarines of WWII Veterans Association.

Lucy Foster, 79, a woman whose brother, Wardour Britain, died in May 1945 aboard the USS Lagarto, said, “Now we know that he isn't just missing, we know where he is.” She is one of many relatives who can now get some closure for loved ones that have remained lost beneath the waves for six decades.

At the time of writing, divers are currently trying to obtain Pentagon permission to visit the wreck to conduct research and documentation.

Fateful encounter

USS Lagarto was one of many submarines produced during World War II by the Manitowoc Shipbuilding Co in Manitowoc , Wisconsin . The submarine was launched on May 28, 1944, in Lake Michigan . After test trials and training in Lake Michigan, Lagarto entered a floating dry-dock and was floated down the Mississippi River to New Orleans , where it departed for the Pacific.

Following a number of successful missions in Japanese waters the Lagarto (SS-371), under the command of Frank D Latta, departed Subic Bay in the Philippines for the South China Sea on April 12, 1945. She was directed to patrol in the Gulf of Siam , where sister-ship Baya (SS-318) joined her on May 2. That afternoon, Baya signaled that she was tracking a tanker traveling under heavy escort. The same night Baya tried to attack, but was driven off by enemy escorts equipped with radar.

The two submarines rendezvoused early next morning to discuss attack plans. The following night Baya made a midnight attack, but was again driven off by the unusually alert Japanese escorts. Early next morning, May 4, when Baya tried to contact her teammate, Lagarto made no reply. Since Japanese records state that during the night of May 3-4, mine-layer Hatsutaka attacked an American submarine in that location, it is presumed that Lagarto perished in battle with all hands. Its 86 crew members are still listed as missing in action.

Martin Young has been diving in Southeast Asia for many years. For more information about wreck diving in Thailand and Southeast Asia , please visit Asia Dive Site

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