Old photos of flood inside Bangkok's Grand Palace circulate online after deluge

Published on October 25, 2024 at 11:26
Updated on October 28, 2024 at 02:58
3 min read
By Chayanit ITTHIPONGMAETEE, AFP Thailand

Following heavy rainfall and flash floods in Bangkok on October 22, 2024, old photos of flooding inside the Thai capital's Grand Palace were shared hundreds of times on social media. These images were taken in 2014 and 2015 when the palace was deluged. The Bangkok Metropolitan Administration (BMA) told AFP the floodwaters that hit the popular tourist site in October 2024 were drained within an hour.

"[Officials] let floods happen in Bangkok's old town. Is it intentional?" read a Thai-language X post on October 24, 2024.

The photo -- reposted more than 300 times before it was deleted -- shows floodwater inside the Grand Palace, a popular tourist attraction in Bangkok, with visitors wearing raincoats.

On the same day, another Facebook post made a similar claim, sharing another photo showing visitors with umbrellas.

The caption read, "At 2.12pm on October 23, reports say heavy rain in the afternoon caused flooding in the Grand Palace and surrounding areas..."

Screenshot of the misleading post

Screenshot of the misleading post

The photos were shared in a similar misleading context here and here.

The posts emerged after Bangkok's old town experienced heavy rain and flooding on October 22, 2024. Officials from the Phra Nakhon district, where the Grand Palace is located, published photos of the flooding on October 22 as did the Thai-language news website The Standard (archived links here and here).

The Bangkok Metropolitan Administration (BMA) told AFP on October 25 that the palace and nearby areas experienced a brief flood due to heavy rain in the afternoon of October 22. However, it clarified that the floodwater was drained within an hour.

"The floodwater took approximately an hour to drain and then dries up. The total rainfall at the Phra Nakhon District Office [on October 22] was 100 millimetres," a BMA spokesperson said.

Some social media users falsely claimed that the Grand Palace had "never" been hit by floods before.

AFP captured flooding inside the Grand Palace here and here in 2011.

The photos shared in the posts also show flooding at the site in 2014 and 2015.

Previous deluges

Using a reverse image search on Google, AFP found the first photo in an article from October 22, 2015, published by Thailand's daily newspaper Thairath (archived link).

The article's headline read, "Rainwater couldn't drain in time. Grand Palace flooded, but opens to tourists as usual."

Below is a screenshot comparison between the misleading post (left) and the original photo published in the Thairath article in October 2015 (right):

Screenshot comparison between the misleading post (left) and the original photo published on the Thairath article in October 2015 (right)

The Bangkok Metropolitan Administration (BMA) on October 24, 2024, announced on its social media channels that the photo is "old" from 2015 and urged the public not to share it in a misleading context (archived link).

The second photo was traced to Thai PBS reporter Kowit Boondham, who posted the photo on his X account on October 23, 2014 (archived link).

He shared it alongside the caption, "2.12pm Grand Palace got flooded after heavy rain."

Below is a screenshot comparison between the misleading post (left) and Kowit's X post in October 2014 (right):

Screenshot comparison between the misleading post (left) and Kowit's X post in October 2014 (right)

Kowit confirmed with AFP on October 25 that he took the photo in 2015 before it was shared with a misleading context.

"I took the photo myself. It was a long time ago," Kowit said. "I remember it was raining heavily, and the rainwater couldn't drain in time."

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