A fierce storm slammed into a market as the rainy season arrived in Thailand.

Video shows the raging gales battering the Sports Authority of Thailand Market in Bangkok, dismantling tents and blowing down stalls on April 28.

Panicked vendors scrambled to hold down their equipment as they waited for the storm to die down.

The Thai Meteorological Department had forecasted thunderstorms and gusty winds on Friday. It said the southerly and southeasterly winds were bringing humidity from the Gulf of Thailand and South China Sea to upper Thailand.

The storm came as temperatures soared to 45 degrees Celsius last month during a heat wave across the Asia Pacific region.

Maximiliano Herrera, a climatologist and weather historian, described the scorching heat as the 'worst April heatwave in Asian history'.

In Thai capital Bangkok, residents were warned not to go outside amid 42 degrees Celsius temperatures causing power outages due to surging demand from air con units and fans running.

The country's national weather service said the heat index - what the temperature feels like when combined with humidity - hit a record 54C (129F).

The warm weather is now giving way to extreme tropical storms.

The Thai Meteorological Department warned that southerly and southeasterly winds prevailing over upper Thailand would strengthen between April 23 and 26.

Outbreaks of summer storms, accompanied by thunderstorms, gusty winds, hail, and lightning strikes, were expected to affect the northeastern and eastern parts of the country first, before spreading to other regions.