A business woman driving a pick-up truck died in a flooded Bangkok tunnel in the wee hours of Thursday morning, right after exiting her housing complex in Prawet District near Airport Link’s Ban Thap Chang station.
At 2am, Bangkok’s Prawet police station received a report regarding a woman trapped in her vehicle at the bottom of a tunnel that had become completely submerged in rainwater.
A cousin of victim Panumat Sae-tae, 41, explained that Panumat had just driven out of her housing complex at the time of the accident.
Because the tunnel’s lights had blacked out, Panumat drove into the tunnel without realizing it was quickly filling with water, reported Sanook. Her engine consequently cut out before she called her family in a panic and tried to get out the vehicle.
Shortly after, Panumat’s mobile phone lost its signal and was unreachable.
The family reportedly rushed out to help but it was too late. Prawet police had to call divers from the Poh Teck Tung Foundation (Rescue Unit Department) to retrieve the body.
The water reportedly reached the ceiling along the entire length of the 100-meter long tunnel, according to Amarin TV.
Tanasit Matepunmeaung, director of Prawet district, told local reporters that the housing complex is responsible for their own drainage system and the water should never reached as high as it did.
However, on the night of the accident, it was raining heavily and the water pump responsible for draining the facility broke under the strain.
It took Prawet police a reported seven hours to pump out enough water to even begin the extraction of the truck.
Panumat’s body was finally retrieved at about 5:30am.
While Coconuts cannot remember anything like this happening before in the capital, it begs the question: in areas where low-lying ground is prone to heavy flooding and drainage systems are lacking, shouldn’t we have a system in a place to warn citizens about potential danger zones?
Let us know your thoughts @CoconutsBangkok.
