Tragic blast: Thai teen’s hand lost in school bomb scare
A teenager lost most of his hand after a bomb he discovered exploded as he tried to remove it from a school in the northeastern province of Chaiyaphum in Thailand
Children from the school went to play some sports together on Sunday, July 16. While the 11 year olds were about to play football, one of them noticed an object looking like a bomb in the field and decided to seek help from 14 year old boy.
The boy decided to pick up the bomb and was on the way to hand it over to the community leader when he stopped to play rattan ball (an Asian form of volleyball) with friends. Foolishly, he held the bomb in his hand while playing. The teenager then fell on the floor making the bomb explode. The explosion severely injured his left hand and he was rushed to the hospital.
The rescue team that facilitated the transport to the hospital speculated that the bomb was probably made by a teenage group from outside of the community. One rescuer disclosed that a few nights prior to the incident, a group of teenagers on motorcycles visited the scene at midnight. Residents reported hearing several explosions that night.
After the accident, the school and community leader monitored the area and encountered a group of teenagers at midnight. However, the group immediately left the scene after realising that they were being observed.
Channel 3 reported that the teenagers came from another community in an attempt to attack teenagers in this area. Prior to this regrettable incident, conflicting messages had been exchanged between members of the two groups on social media, though these exchanges have since been deleted.
The accident raised awareness of the safety of the student evoking memories of a recent gas cylinder explosion at a school in Bangkok last month. The explosion occurred during a fire drill which ended up killing one of the students watching the assignment. Five others were also injured.
