The new Bangkok airport

[Bamboo Grove]

The Guinness world records of Suvarnabhumi

Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, once again, has made us feel good about ourselves. Yesterday, he made a much touted test flight with his entourage from Don Muang airport to Suvarnabhumi International Airport to show us how grand the new airport is.

There were more than 1,000 guests, including a major contingent from the press corps, at Suvarnabhumi to celebrate the birth of the new airport, which is expected to propel the Thai aviation industry into the ranks of the global great.

You have to be Thai to feel the blood running through your entire body. For the sight of Thaksin and his entourage celebrating the grandeur of the new airport at the tarmac was indescribable. It was a pride of galactic proportion. Since we’re a great nation, we deserve the world’s greatest airport. Without Thaksin, we would be deprived of this great feeling for the Bt150-billion airport that will put Heathrow of London, John F Kennedy of New York, Chok Lap Kok of Hong Kong and Changi of Singapore to shame.

With this grand design, it is no accident that the Suvarnabhumi International Airport is racking up so many amazing feats surely worth of being recorded in the book “Guinness World Recordsâ€

[PeteC]

....Suvarnabhumi

I have heard that the King suggested this name and I mean no disrespect if true. No one is going to remember how to pronounce it or spell it. It will become "Bangkok Airport" or "SB Airport" or worst of all possibilities "SUV Airport". I know it's Thai, this is Thailand but 80% of arrivals are foreigners. Would have made sense to name it something else. Pete

[buksida]

Maybe its just me but the "soft opening" of an airport sounds pretty scary.

[VincentD]

It cost the public coffers eleven million baht to stage the stunt. Not everyone was happy, one of the staff who has property 3 kms from the airport borrowed a decibel level meter to see if higher than normal sound levels would affect the value of the said property...