A fire on a double-decker bus carrying migrant workers killed 20 people early Friday, a week after 18 people died in another bus accident that showed the continuing dangers of Thailand’s roads.
The fire was reported to police around 1:30 a.m. in Tak province in western Thailand along the border with Myanmar. The bus was heading to a factory in an industrial zone near Bangkok. Police and a survivor said the workers were from Myanmar.
Police Lt. Raewat Aiemtak said 27 people managed to escape the blazing vehicle, with one of them severely burned.
The cause of the fire wasn’t immediately known, but Raewat said the driver reported the fire started in the middle of the bus and spread quickly. People in the front managed to escape but those in the back of the vehicle were trapped.
A survivor, Pa Pa Hlaing, described the accident by phone to the Associated Press. She said some passengers had smelled something burning, but went back to sleep because they assumed it was smoke from outside.
“When we were asleep, some people from the back of the bus started shouting and screaming ‘fire, fire’ and as we awoke, the smoke was already filling the bus,” said the 19-year-old from Myanmar.
Scared that the bus might explode, those who escaped ran as far from it as they could, she said. Police arrived 15 or 20 minutes later, she estimated, but firefighters took longer, so no one was able to do anything to help those still inside.
Associated Press