News Analysis
PHUKET: Police have removed the power point set into a footpath in Patong that is being blamed for causing the death of a 20-year-old British tourist in flooding rains last week.
A worker in Soi Bangla, a popular walking street that attracts thousands of tourists, told Phuketwan that police officers removed the power plug point minutes before a reporter arrived at the scene on Friday.
Others people who work close to the paved footpath section outside the Ocean Plaza department store in Soi Bangla said workers knew that the plug, set into the paving stones at ground level, could be dangerous. They avoided going near it, especially in wet weather.
Charles Antony Thomas, 20, a British tourist, had no such inside knowledge. As a visitor, he was unaware that his life was at risk in the pouring rain about 6am on Thursday morning as Patong - and large sections of Phuket - began to flood.
Witnesses report that the young man collapsed into a sitting position on top of the power plug point, with electricity charging through his body.
Mr Thomas's male friend and travelling companion has been too traumatised by the event to describe what happened, but witnesses say he and others tried to pull Mr Thomas free and were lucky to escape with their lives.
Thailand has a reputation for poor electrical wiring. Earlier this year, a Swedish couple died when their shower at a Krabi resort became ''live.'' This kind of electrical nightmare has also occurred on Phuket.
Canadian Noah Yelizarov, 19, died as a result of electrical shock on October 9, 2004, on Phuket while on holiday with three friends.
Knee-deep in flood water in Patong of the kind that covered large areas on Thursday, the young man was electrocuted when exposed wires on an electric pole sent a deadly charge through the water.
The death of Mr Thomas is now likely to renew the outcry about the shoddy standards still evidently occurring at the very heart of what is Phuket's most popular tourist destination.
Patong police have so far been reluctant to speculate about the case.
However, it seems that any one of the hundreds of thousands of visitors who have walked that popular street in rain or shine so far this year could have been a victim. For all we know, there may be other power points in pavements.
It doesn't take a master's degree in technology to know that power points should not be set in the ground anywhere, especially where thousands of people walk and where rain falls frequently in large quantities.
Local authorities are likely to be called upon to answer questions on behalf of Phuket's tourism industry.
It's expected that the British Embassy will continue to press for details about this case. Other embassies who have large numbers of visitors to Phuket will also be seeking an explanation for this needless death.
And will anyone be held accountable? Are they ever? Sad that of ALL these people no one took the initiative to take some action. Such apathy here for safety and the protection of life.
Shame on everyone who knew.
By the way are those wires sticking up out of the cement? Is that brick to cover the hole the safety measure by the police?
Perhaps we do need someone with a masters.
Posted by Vfaye on August 28, 2011 11:39