Police Lance Corporal Thanakorn Phetthong, 23, has become the 39th person to die following the fire at the Rong Beer Na Lat Phrao venue in Bangkok's Chatuchak district.

Thanakorn, a squad leader with Division 1 of the Special Operations Division, died at 9.44am on 15 August 2026 in the trauma intensive care unit at Police Hospital. He had been receiving continuous treatment for severe injuries since the blaze on 12 July.

Guard was found near an exit

Thanakorn, a police commando, was working as a security guard at the venue at the time of the fire.

Officials found him in the restaurant hall, near Exit 2, before rushing him to hospital. His injuries were severe and doctors were ultimately unable to save his life after more than a month of treatment.

His death raises the death toll from the fire to 39.

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16 August 2026

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What Lance Corporal Phetthong's death really tells us is that burn injuries don’t just wound, they dismantle the body piece by piece over time.

Sadly, that’s the part people never seem to grasp until a case like this drags on for weeks. The initial blaze is only the beginning, while the real battle is the slow, brutal cascade that follows.

Deep burns don’t “stabilise”. They trigger organ failure, infections, fluid shifts, and endless surgical interventions. Even with top‑tier ICU care, the body is often fighting a losing battle on multiple fronts.

Lance Corporal Phetthong sucomming to his injuries only highlights this. Once someone has sustained catastrophic burns, survival becomes a marathon of ventilators, grafts, and round‑the‑clock monitoring.

The fire ends in minutes but the suffering lasts much longer. Compensation to the victims and their families must allow for this!

While the above death from burns is tragic, autopsies found that 27 victims died from carbon monoxide and cyanide poisoning after inhaling smoke.

The gases are produced by fires and "when inhaled, block oxygen from reaching the blood, resulting in death", he told AFP.

"If inhaled in large quantities, they can cause death within four minutes.

https://www.channelnewsasia.com/asia/bangkok-bar-fire-victims-smoke-inhalation-thailand-6260351

I wonder how that investigation is coming along.. The fire happened more than a month ago. The authorities need to release more info.

What investigation, oh! You mean the one that happened a while back, it's been superseeded by more important things as it's now past history, this is standard procedure for Thailand .

An off topic deflection post about a night club fire in 2003 in Rhode Island, USA has been removed.

1 hour ago, ronnie50 said:

I wonder how that investigation is coming along.. The fire happened more than a month ago. The authorities need to release more info.

Proper investigations of large-scale fires can take more than a year.

And that includes fires linked to the installation of flammable insulation materials after noise complaints from those nearby.

Edited August 16Aug 16 by JerryM