The headline in the Global New Light of Myanmar had phrases you don’t ever want to see together: “grisly corpse” and “local water well.”
According to the small report, a woman in Bago region’s Pyay town found the body in a well on Monday while attempting to get water.
Neither the name or gender of the corpse been identified, nor has a cause of death.
There may not be foul play involved.
Incidents of accidental suffocations in wells when victims try to pursue lost property have been documented.
In September 2015, a man in Kachin state died from lack of oxygen when he tried to rescue a cow that had fallen into an abandoned well.
The year before that in Cambodia’s Siem Reap province, 7 people died after attempting to retrieve a cigarette lighter and some money from the bottom of a well. In that case, authorities also cited the low level of oxygen as a cause of death.
