PHUKET: Six relatives, including three children, escaped serious injury when the van they were in flipped twice before coming to rest on Thepkrasattri Road in Mai Khao yesterday afternoon. None of the adults or three children, aged 8 to 11, was wearing a seat belt when the van slid on the rain-slippery road and hit the median at a curve in Baan Mak Prok.
PHUKET: A helmetless man died of head injuries last night after his motorbike collided with a SUV being driven at high speed on Pa Khlok Road near the Heroines‘ Monument (map
PHUKET: A tanker truck parked roadside with vapor pouring from its pressurized tank full of oxygen sent Phuket residents into a state of high alert last night. The 18-wheeler remained parked in front of the Thalang Museum, near the Heroine’s Monument (map
Special Report: PHUKET: Soldiers and other security personnel arriving on the island to enjoy R&R leave or even to retire in the sun is nothing new to Phuket, but the arrest of ex-US soldier Joseph “Rambo” Hunter this past week (story
PHUKET: The body of a Chinese tourist who disappeared while swimming at Karon Beach on Monday was found washed ashore at Kata Beach, about three kilometers away, yesterday afternoon. “We have now found the body of Sheng Caoliang, who was 31 years old and reported as missing on Sunday,” Karon Police officer Lt Sathaporn Seenoon said. “Mr Sheng and a friend went for a swim at Karon Beach.
PHUKET: A former Krabi village headman who owned a security company was gunned down at the site of a new job early yesterday morning, along with two of his staff. The three men were shot in a security box at the entrance to the Krabi Rubber Plantation Research Center in Lam Thap just after midnight. Witnesses said the three men were talking in the sentry box when a pickup truck pulled up and at least three men got out.
PHUKET: Phuket Court Chief Judge Parinya Chaowalittawin became a traffic-accident statistic over the weekend when he survived an accident en route to Krabi. “I was on my way to see my parents in Trang, and had left Phuket at about 4:30am on Saturday,” Mr Parinya told the Phuket Gazette
PHUKET: The incoming commander of the Phuket Provincial Police, Maj Gen Ong-art Phiwruangnont, has vowed to better protect the privacy and human dignity of suspects by calling for careful consideration before staging public “re-enactments” of crimes and criminal press conferences. “I will not order a ban on officers staging such events, but I will ask the superintendents of all police stations across Phuket to carefully consider the implications of staging media stunts,” Gen Ong-art, who yesterday officially began his first day as the island’s top cop, told the Phuket Gazette. “These media events are not in line with suspects’ rights to privacy as protected under Section 28 of the Constitution of the Kingdom of Thailand,” Gen Ong-art told the Gazette.
PHUKET: The Similan Islands National Park authority has warned tour operators over a group of people posing as park officers and offering reduced entry fees to the islands. “A couple of weeks ago, a number of tour operators informed me that there was a group of people who approached them, claiming to be national park officers,” Similan Islands National Park acting chief Nat Kongkaesorn told the Phuket Gazette today. “They said the tour operator could pay a reduced entrance fee based on the size of the boat engine instead of the number tourists on the vessel.
PHUKET: Expats contribute to Phuket’s well-being in various ways.