Rescuers find Burmese migrant worker’s body near Chon Buri island

Rescuers and police found a Burmese migrant worker’s body off an island in Chon Buri province on Sunday night. The search team found the body floating five nautical miles north of Koh Si Chang.

The dead man was a boat crew member reported to have fallen into the sea on the night of January 11, four days before his body was found.

The man reportedly fell into the sea while fishing near Koh Pai in the Naklua sub-district of Chon Buri’s Bang Lamung district.

The man was wearing a blue shirt and green pants. The team transported his body to the mainland at Bang Saen Beach in the Saen Suk sub-district of the main city district.

Local journalist Pooweset Morya wrote in a Facebook post that officials were waiting for relatives to confirm the man’s identity because the body was decomposing. Video footage shows the rescue team handling the blurred body.

Last year, there was another tragic incident in which a Burmese boat worker’s body was found in Chon Buri.

Tourists spotted the body at a beach in the main city district on May 24. Emergency workers said in a report that the body found on Bang Saen Beach belonged to 40 year old Phu Sao, a Burmese boat worker who had gone missing after he fell into the ocean.

One emergency responder estimated that Phu had been dead for two or three days. He said he had received a missing person report of a boat worker who fell into the ocean near Koh Pai, and he thought it was the same person. A police report stated that Phu was only wearing a red long-sleeved shirt.

Phu’s employer arrived on the scene to confirm that Phu was her worker who went missing on May 20. She had already reported Phu missing to Pattaya Police. Phu’s body was initially transferred to Chon Buri Hospital for a preliminary autopsy.