Andrew's royal exit is the latest crisis for Britain's monarchy

LONDON (AP) — Holding prestige but not power, Britain’s monarchy is finely tuned to public sentiment.

That's been evident with the disgrace of Andrew Mountbatten Windsor, who was stripped of his princely title and his spacious home by his brother King Charles on Thursday, a banishment that has left the disgraced royal increasingly exposed to scrutiny both in the U.K. and the U.S. over his friendship with the deceased sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

Following years of scandals related to Andrew, Charles arguably took the biggest step of his reign by seeking to insulate the monarchy from any further scandals relating to Andrew and his connections with Epstein, who took his own life in prison in August 2019 while awaiting trial on sex-trafficking charges, more than a decade after his initial conviction.

It's not the first time the current iteration of the British monarchy — the House of Windsor — has been in crisis over the past century and where the future of the institution has been threatened.

George Gross, a royal expert at King’s College London, said the most recent precedent for what has happened to Andrew is the 1917 Titles Deprivation Act, which “saw various members of loosely affiliated royals and dukes and members of the peerage losing titles if they had sided with Germany in the First World War.”

The royal families of Europe are intertwined, and Britain’s is heavily German, especially after Queen Victoria married Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, with whom she had nine children.

When Britain and Germany went to war in 1914, some members of the wider British royal family found themselves on opposing sides.

Britain’s King George V changed the family name from Saxe-Coburg and Gotha to Windsor in 1917, and initiated legislation to strike out the titles of princes and lords “who have, during the present war, borne arms against His Majesty or His Allies, or who have adhered to His Majesty’s enemies.”

One target was Prince Ernest Augustus, Duke of Cumberland and Teviotdale, who was a U.K. royal and also a prince of Hanover. His title was removed for being an enemy of Britain under the 1917 act, which was enacted in 1919, once the war was over.

According to the House of Commons Library, “this was the first and only time such a title has been removed in this way.”

The relationship between Edward, Prince of Wales, and U.S. socialite Wallis Simpson was a headache that turned into a constitutional crisis. Simpson was twice divorced, and Edward, the heir to the throne, was destined to be ceremonial head of the Church of England, which did not allow divorced people to remarry in church.

The prince became King Edward VIII when his father King George V died in early 1936. He continued to say he wanted to marry Simpson, despite the opposition of the British government.

Forced to choose between duty and passion, he gave up the throne in December 1936, announcing in a radio broadcast that “I have found it impossible ... to discharge my duties as king as I would wish to do without the help and support of the woman I love.”

The news was a surprise to many in Britain, though not beyond it. British newspapers had not reported on the relationship, and American magazines had offending articles cut out before going on sale.

The abdication set the monarchy on a new course. Edward’s younger brother took the throne as King George VI. He was succeeded by his daughter, Queen Elizabeth II, and after her 70-year reign by her son, King Charles III. All doubled down on the idea that the monarch’s primary attribute should be a sense of duty — something Edward, in the popular imagination, lacked.

Edward and Wallis, now the Duke and Duchess of Windsor and suspected by some of Nazi sympathies, were sent to the Bahamas, where he served as governor. After the war they mostly stayed away from Britain, living a life of nomadic luxury.

The death of Princess Diana — the ex-wife of Charles — in a car crash in Paris in 1997 at the age of 36 shocked the world and left her family, including sons William and Harry, then 15 and 12, in mourning.

The strength of public feeling caught the royal family by surprise. Mounds of floral tributes piled up outside the gates of Buckingham Palace and Diana’s Kensington Palace home to mourn a princess who had been ostracized by the royal family after her divorce from Charles in 1992.

The queen was at Balmoral in Scotland on her summer holiday with her husband Prince Philip, Charles, William and Harry. The family kept their grief private and stuck to routine — taking the ashen-faced boys to church on Sunday morning — and the queen did not issue a statement for several days.

She was advised to make a public display of grief by Prime Minister Tony Blair, who perfectly caught the public mood with his own tribute calling Diana “the people’s princess.”

After newspaper headlines urging “Speak to us Ma’am” and “Show us you care,” the queen made a live televised address to the nation on the eve of Diana’s funeral.

“What I say to you now, as your queen and as a grandmother, I say from my heart,” the queen said, acknowledging the country’s grief, praising Diana and promising to cherish her memory.

Until the Epstein scandal reared up again last year, Andrew had been trying to regain favor with the family. He may have benefited indirectly from the trouble with Prince Harry, who was the source of most of the drama at the time outside of the family’s high-profile medical problems.

Harry became estranged from his father and older brother, Prince William, heir to the throne, when he and his wife, Meghan, stepped down from their working roles and moved to California in 2020. The couple famously aired their grievances with the royal family in a tell-all interview to Oprah Winfrey and a revealing Netflix series. Harry, also known as the Duke of Sussex, then fueled the tensions by revealing personal conversations in his memoir, “Spare.”

Harry also broke from royal protocol in turning to the courts to sort out his legal problems. He became the first senior royal to testify in court in more than a century in his successful phone hacking lawsuit against the Daily Mirror.

A failed legal effort to restore his police protection detail that was stripped from him when he left royal work, though, was seen as an attack on his father’s government.

When the courts finally rejected the lawsuit, it provide a chance for a reunion between father and son. The two shared a cup of tea at Charles’ London abode, Clarence House, in September. It was their first meeting in over a year. It lasted less than an hour.

FILE - Prince Andrew leaves St. Giles Cathedral after the arrival of the coffin containing the remains of his mother Queen Elizabeth, in Edinburgh, Scotland, Sept. 12, 2022. (AP Photo/Petr David Josek, File)

FILE - Britain's Prince Andrew, left, and Britain's King Charles III leave after the Requiem Mass service for the Duchess of Kent at Westminster Cathedral in London, Tuesday, Sept. 16, 2025. (AP Photo/Joanna Chan, File)

FILE - Britain's King Charles III, from bottom left, Camilla, the Queen Consort, Prince Harry and Meghan, Duchess of Sussex watch as the coffin of Queen Elizabeth II is placed into the hearse following the state funeral service in Westminster Abbey in central London Monday Sept. 19, 2022. (AP Photo/Martin Meissner, Pool, File)

FILE - Britain's Prince Charles casts a concerned glance towards his sons Prince William, left, and Prince Harry as they wait for the coffin of Princess Diana to be loaded into a hearse outside Westminster Abbey in London., Sept. 6, 1997. (AP Photo/John Gaps III, File)

FILE - The Duke of Windsor, Prince Edward stands with his wife the Duchess of Windsor, Wallis Simpson, before he sailed on the Queen Mary from New York on Feb. 7, 1952, en route to England for the funeral of his brother, the late King George VI. (AP Photo, File)

BANGKOK (AP) — Floodwaters in Thailand ’s capital were slowly receding on Monday after nearly continuous rainfall over the weekend, although some neighborhoods and major roads remained inundated.

Rain continued intermittently, but Bangkok city officials said conditions had improved enough to accelerate drainage efforts. Water levels in four main canals had risen too high over the weekend to take in runoff from surrounding communities.

More rain was forecast across much of Thailand, although Bangkok was expected to receive less. Cambodia and Myanmar were also experiencing severe weather.

The weekend flooding affected 329,000 households, or about 700,000 people, the Bangkok Flood Control Center reported, according to Deputy Gov. Tavida Kamolvej. Thai media reported two flood-related deaths in the city and at least 10 nationwide.

Gov. Chadchart Sittipunt declared a flood emergency Saturday across all 50 city districts, although some were relatively unscathed. He said authorities were prioritizing assistance for vulnerable residents, including older people and those with disabilities, by delivering supplies or evacuating them. City officials said nearly 7,000 people were staying in shelters.

Neighborhoods in eastern Bangkok were hit hardest. Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul donned white rain boots Sunday night to inspect a heavily flooded housing estate in Bang Kapi district and help distribute relief supplies.

Water was about knee-deep Monday near a train station and shopping mall in Bang Kapi. Despite intermittent downpours, shoppers waded through the water carrying bags, backpacks and boxes of groceries. Some traveled to and from the station in a small boat provided by the mall.

For Naowarat Supanikorn, a 55-year-old maid who shares a single-story house with three dogs and six cats, the flooding was more than an inconvenience.

She said she realized at about 1:30 a.m. on Saturday that water was seeping into her home.

“I had to take my dogs and cats out,” she said. “I had to leave them with my neighbor. I have taken them back today because they said the sun would come out, but it looks like the rain will come back.”

She said the flooding in her neighborhood reached above her hips at its highest, and had since dropped to about knee-level. She said the bigger problem is that she has lost her job working at a condominium.

“My workplace also said if I can’t come to work, they’re happy to take my resignation. So I thought, that’s fine, I’ll quit.”

To try to generate some income, she bought supplies to make some food she can sell streetside, but business is slow in the flooded conditions.

“It’s stressful. If the bills come, I’d be cooked, because I don’t have work now. If I have to pay for water or electricity now it would be bad,” she said. “I’m not worried about me but I’m worried about my pets. I’ve lived with them my whole life. They’re my priority. It’s ok if I don’t have work and starve myself, but I’d like help for my pets.”

The flood also has had knock-on effects, including panic buying of food, disrupted supply chains for food and other items, and staffing problems at various enterprises whose employees were unable to get to their jobs.

The Thai Air Force announced it was sending 69 ground personnel to Bangkok's Suvarnabhumi Airport to help clear a backlog of passenger luggage caused largely by airport workers being unable to get to their place of work.

“This deployment is a vital mission to care for, assist, and facilitate travelers — including tourists from around the world — ensuring smooth operations and preventing delays in ground services, thereby upholding the nation’s positive image,” the air force said.

The airport previously attributed the baggage pileup to “insufficient staffing to support ground handling operations” and problems with some baggage carts.

The disruptions delayed some departures and forced arriving passengers to wait longer than usual for their luggage, with baggage from several flights still undelivered, the airport said.

The government declared special holidays on Monday and Tuesday for state offices. It advised state enterprises, financial institutions, private businesses and hospitals to determine whether they needed to remain open.

Thailand’s meteorological agency forecast heavy to very heavy rain across several parts of the country. It warned residents, particularly in northern, central and eastern regions, to prepare for possible flash floods, river overflows, forest runoff and landslides, especially near waterways, foothills and low-lying areas.

In neighboring Myanmar, at least 10 people were killed and dozens were missing after heavy rain triggered widespread flooding and landslides in the southern coastal region of Tanintharyi, local media reported.

Dawei township recorded 346 millimeters (13.62 inches) of rain Monday, breaking an 80-year-old record. Myanmar’s Meteorology Department warned that conditions could worsen as the storm front moved closer to Yangon.

Flash floods struck at least 10 provinces in Cambodia, affecting 44,889 families and forcing nearly 4,000 people to evacuate, according to disaster management officials.

The agency overseeing the archaeological park in Siem Reap province, home to the centuries-old Angkor temple complex, said it was operating water gates and diversion systems to reduce the risk of flooding.

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Associated Press writer Sopheng Cheang in Phnom Penh, Cambodia contributed to this report.

Residents of a building look out at the flooded street after heavy rain in Bangkok, Thailand, Monday, Sept. 28, 2026. (AP Photo/Sakchai Lalit)

Rescuers evacuate a patient from a flooded area to a safer place in Bangkok, Thailand, Monday, Sept. 28, 2026. (AP Photo/Sakchai Lalit)

Rescuers evacuate people from a flooded area to a safer place in Bangkok, Thailand, Monday, Sept. 28, 2026. (AP Photo/Sakchai Lalit)

The streets are flooded after a heavy rain, in Bangkok, Thailand, Monday, Sept. 28, 2026. (AP Photo/Sakchai Lalit)

People wade through a flooded street after a heavy rain in Bangkok, Thailand, Monday, Sept. 28, 2026. (AP Photo/Sakchai Lalit)