VIENTIANE (Laotian Times): Tropical Storms Maysak and Bavi triggered severe flooding in Khounkham district, Khammouane province in Laos.
The two storms affected 6,563 people and caused nearly LAK 40 billion (USD 1.77 million) in damage, the district’ Disaster Management Committee reported on July 21
The committee’s spokesperson, Somwang Souvanthong, said that persistent heavy rainfall from the two storms hit 1,365 families across nine villages.
According to Somwang, floodwaters also swept through paddy fields covering 3,234 hectares in 19 villages across the district, destroying cassava and rubber plantations, irrigation systems, and livestock.
Total losses in Khounkham district reached LAK 39.7 billion (about USD 1.75 million), Somwang said.
The two storms battered mostly the northern and central parts of Laos in early July, with the Department of Meteorology and Hydrology having issued warnings beforehand for four provinces, Xieng Khouang, Xaysomboun, Bolikhamxay, and Khammouane.
Maysak made landfall in southern China on 3 July, triggering flooding that killed at least 39 people.
Bavi followed just over a week later, growing into a super typhoon that battered Guam and the Northern Mariana Islands in the Pacific Ocean, killed at least 17 people in the Philippines, and brought strong winds and rain to Taiwan and Japan’s Ryukyu Islands before making a double landfall in China’s Zhejiang province on 11 July.
Rain, Risk, and Readiness
Flooding of this kind has been an almost annual feature of Laos’ rainy season, which runs roughly from May to October.
Laos has weathered far larger disasters in recent years, most notably Typhoon Yagi in 2024, which triggered flooding and landslides across northern and central provinces, killed at least four people, and affected more than 165,000 others nationwide.
For 2026, the government has tried to close the gap between policy and response on the ground.
In June, the National Water Resources Committee approved a 2026 flood response plan, tightening oversight of nearly a hundred hydropower operators and appointing local coordinators at dam sites. -- Laotian Times
