3 electricians killed in explosion in central Thailand

An explosion at a smelting plant in central Thailand’s Ratchaburi province was fatal for three electricians last night. The electricians had been sent to the plant to fix a control board, according to police. But as they were working, the control board exploded, and a fire broke out.

Factory workers scrambled to put out the fire with an extinguisher and water, but 4 of them were then electrocuted. The fire was brought under control shortly afterward.

The workers and the electricians were all brought to a nearby hospital, where the electricians were pronounced dead due to severe burns. The incident happened in the Photharam district.

Another tragic explosion happened just last month in Thailand’s northeast province of Sakhon Nakhon. A university lecturer doing research at a garbage dump was killed by an explosion there. The lecturer, 41 year old Pichai Srimanta, had been doing a research project to extract oil from plastic waste at a garbage dump.

A worker who witnessed the tragedy said the extraction machine had been stopped so that the 2 furnaces could cool down. Steam pressure in one of the furnaces then blew off its cover, and the cover hit Pichai, killing him on the spot, according to the director of the municipal public works office.

SOURCE: Thai PBS WORLD