Residents in Thailand's Ban Thanon Khot are accustomed to the rumbling of trains – a key mode of transportation connecting the remote town with major cities. But on Wednesday, the mundane rhythm ended in tragedy.
The noise was abnormally loud. A huge, crashing sound, said school volunteer Pitchaya Promenade. I saw a blue crane sliding. It seemed stuck for a moment, and suddenly it flipped over.
The construction crane had collapsed onto a moving train, killing at least 32 people and injuring 66 others. Most of the victims were students and workers traveling for school and work. Thailand's Public Health Ministry reported that three people are still missing following the accident.
Rescuers were still pulling bodies out of the mangled train when the BBC arrived at the scene in the evening. Parts of it were completely crushed, reflecting the horrific scale of the incident.
If I had to describe the damage visually, it looked like a spoon scooping into a slice of cake, explained Pitchaya, who provided first aid to some of the injured. Witnesses described horrifying scenes, including an elderly woman suspended upside down and people trapped, crying for help amid rising smoke from a burning train carriage.
The crane was being used to create an overhead railway system that is a part of a $5.4 billion China-backed project linking Bangkok with southwestern China via Laos. This situation raises serious safety concerns, as the crane's collapse is tied to the same construction company responsible for a previous collapse during an earthquake in Bangkok last March.
Thai Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul has called for an investigation into the accident, and the State Railway of Thailand is suing the Italian-Thai Development Company, which managed that section of the railway. Authorities are now faced with the challenge of uncovering why safety measures failed, particularly in a country that has seen a troubling number of deadly construction accidents due to lax regulations.
As the dust settles, the cries of those trapped in the wreckage echo through Ban Thanon Khot, a haunting reminder of the tragedy that unfolded on an ordinary Wednesday.
