Chinese tour bus catches fire – no injuries
We’re used to seeing smoke come out of the back of the hundreds of tour buses moving around Phuket’s roads, but not like this.
22 Chinese tourists and their 50 year old bus driver, Khunchai Pinyo, had a scare yesterday.
“I was driving the bus with 22 Chinese tourists coming back from Thalang to a birds nest shop in Koh Siray. When I arrived near Baan Kuku, I smelt smoke from the back of the bus. However, there was no space to stop the bus so I kept on driving for about 500 meters and realised that the engineering department of the municipality which has fire extinguishers was nearby,” the driver explained.
“I asked the passengers to get off the bus and grabbed the fire extinguisher installed in the bus to apply to the blaze but it didn’t work so I called for help from the municipality staff. Staff used their water truck and had the fire extinguished within 20 minutes.”
22 Chinese tourists were delivered back to their accommodations.
The blaze, which started at the end of the bus, is assumed to have been caused by an electric short circuit in the engine room.
