SONGKHLA – In one of the most heartbreaking scenes from the southern floods, a woman in Hat Yai placed her drowned mother’s body inside a household refrigerator, then let it float beside their flooded home so the powerful current would not carry the body away.
The victim, 80‑year‑old Jamlong Srisuk, known locally as Aunty Jamlong, died in the early hours of Tuesday when a sudden surge of water swept through her single‑storey house in the Ban Phru area on the western side of Hat Yai.
Neighbours said the water rose from ankle level to chest height in under twenty minutes after the U‑Taphao canal overflowed following days of constant monsoon rain.
“She screamed for help, but the current was too strong,” said her daughter, 52‑year‑old Nittaya, her voice breaking as she spoke yesterday from the second‑floor balcony of a relative’s house, now a temporary shelter. “I grabbed her hand, then the water knocked us both over. When I found her again, she had already passed away.”
Afraid that the current would drag her mother’s body into the street and sweep it away in the muddy flow, Nittaya and two neighbours pulled the family’s large refrigerator onto its back, emptied it of food, and gently laid Jamlong’s body inside.
They then tied ropes around the fridge and let it float like a grim raft, secured to the house posts.
“The water was almost three metres deep in some spots,” Nittaya said. “If we left her on the floor, she would have been carried off. I couldn’t let my mother disappear like that.”
Images of the white fridge bobbing in dirty floodwater, held in place by a red nylon rope, have raced across Thai social media. Many users have called it one of the most haunting pictures of the 2025 floods in the South.
Hat Yai Under Water
The story from Ban Phru is just one example of a disaster that has affected more than 2.78 million people in eight southern provinces, according to new figures released this morning by the Department of Disaster Prevention and Mitigation (DDPM).
Hat Yai, often called the South’s unofficial capital and a key trading centre, has been at a standstill for five days in a row. The main railway station is still under about 2.5 metres of water, every flight in and out of Hat Yai International Airport is cancelled until at least Sunday, and several sections of the Asian Highway (Route 4) are cut.
Across Songkhla, Pattani, Nakhon Si Thammarat, Phatthalung, Trang, Satun, Yala, and Narathiwat, floodwater has entered at least 680,000 houses. More than 300,000 people have moved to emergency shelters set up in schools, temples, and state offices.
Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra returned early from an overseas visit and led an emergency cabinet meeting in Bangkok yesterday. The government approved an initial relief budget of 3.2 billion baht. “We will not hold back,” she told reporters. “Every boat, every helicopter, and every soldier is being sent to help those still trapped.”
At the Centara Hotel in central Hat Yai, a well‑known luxury property, more than 400 foreign tourists are stuck. Many are from Malaysia, Singapore, and Europe. They have been unable to leave since Monday. The hotel lobby has turned into a shared sleeping area, with mattresses covering the marble floor while staff hand out bottled water and instant noodles.
“We came for a weekend of shopping,” said Malaysian visitor Melissa Tan, 34, holding her young child. “Now we can’t get out, and the hotel told us the food might run out tomorrow.”
Grief, Faith, and Quiet Strength
Army lorries and private speedboats have been working without pause, taking people from second‑storey windows and rooftops to safer ground. In some hard‑hit areas, residents have formed human chains, passing babies and older people from hand to hand into waiting boats.
Back in Ban Phru, rescue teams in shallow‑bottomed boats finally reached Nittaya’s house yesterday afternoon. They carefully removed Aunty Jamlong’s body from the refrigerator and took it to dry ground so the family could hold a proper funeral in the coming days.
“I only wanted to keep her safe,” Nittaya whispered as monks began to chant beside the simple coffin. “Even after she died, the water tried to take her away from me.”
As darkness fell over Hat Yai, the rain eased for the first time in days. Weather forecasters, however, warned that another monsoon trough is on its way. Huge pumps, each the size of a small lorry, roared along main roads as workers tried to push water back into already swollen canals, but large parts of the city stayed underwater.
For people across southern Thailand, the floods have taken lives, homes, crops, and income. Yet in the middle of such loss, stories like Nittaya’s, a daughter who refused to let the current steal her mother a second time, have become quiet symbols of the South’s stubborn strength.
The fridge that once floated in the flood now sits empty on dry ground, its door bent and twisted, marked by the weight of what it held.
