Four Killed, 32 Injured In Blast In Nakhon Phanom

[writeshack]

Na Doon district is in Maha Sarakham, Yang Sisurat is the adjoining district. From comments and other posts made above it would seem Da Nayshun has screwed up yet again

[masuk]

Australian Govt warning regarding travel in Thailand. 25 Feb.

http://www.smartraveller.gov.au/zw-cgi/view/Advice/Thailand#

[youngXpat]

Why Maha Sarakham? Thought that was just a small uni town!

[Colabamumbai]

And the Thai news just gets more depressing daily. Maybe time to move to Laos or Cambodia.

[Mr Yim]

Why Maha Sarakham? Thought that was just a small uni town!

Maha Sarakham is a province. Na Dun is a nice little town famous for its Stupa. It is one of 3 sites in the world where some of Buddhas bones were discovered. Most Thai Buddhists will visit Na Dun at least once in their life. There are hundreds of stores, fair ground attractions and Morlam for a duration of 9 days during the current festival, when the normally quiet town comes alive. For those of you living in Isaan it is well worth a visit during the festival.

A personal gripe about Na Dun. There is a 2.5 metre crocodile kept in a 2 metre x 4 metre pen at the open air Isaan museum. The poor thing can barely turn around and invariably his has bricks and coins on his back.

[youngXpat]

Why Maha Sarakham? Thought that was just a small uni town!

Maha Sarakham is a province. Na Dun is a nice little town famous for its Stupa. It is one of 3 sites in the world where some of Buddhas bones were discovered. Most Thai Buddhists will visit Na Dun at least once in their life. There are hundreds of stores, fair ground attractions and Morlam for a duration of 9 days during the current festival, when the normally quiet town comes alive. For those of you living in Isaan it is well worth a visit during the festival.

A personal gripe about Na Dun. There is a 2.5 metre crocodile kept in a 2 metre x 4 metre pen at the open air Isaan museum. The poor thing can barely turn around and invariably his has bricks and coins on his back.

Thanks for the info. As you can tell, I've never visited the place.

[webfact]

Four killed in Northeastern temple explosion
By Digital Media

MAHA SARAKHAM, Feb 25 - Four persons, including two police officers, were killed as a bomb exploded during a religious festival in this northeastern province late Sunday night.

The incident took place at the compound of ancient Na Dun stupa where famous Isan percussion band Ponglang Sa-orn was performing a concert on a stage.

Police stopped a male suspect who was seen carrying a hand grenade into the festival compound.

Identified as Winai Jeknam, 32, the man refused to be searched when stopped by the police, and the explosion took place during the struggle.

Two police officers died instantly in the chaos, along with a 12-year-old boy attending the festival with his family.

About 40 persons were wounded and were sent to nearby hospitals.

The fourth death was reported later, among those being treated at hospital.

Mr Winai himself was seriously wounded and lost his right arm.

The suspect was still unable to give any testimony on the deadly blast. (MCOT online news)


-- TNA 2013-02-25

[Fookhaht]

Interesting to follow where and how "fast" the news travels.

I live in Mahasarakham, and my Thai guest got a call from their mother, concerned about their safety. The call came at 4:30 a.m., and had been on radio and TV before that hour.

At about 5 a.m. we turned on the TV, and the news was being reported on channel 3.

At 7:53 a.m. this morning, The Nation reported the blast, but got the province wrong and printed inaccuracies about the number of injured and age of the perpetrator. Three major mistakes in two short news blurbs. The erroneous Nation report was then reposted here at TV at 8:02 a.m.

At 9:19 a.m. the "other English-language" newspaper which may not be named here put out the story with accurate information.

At 2:55 pm, The Australian was posting the news, indicating it had hit the international news services.

As of nearly 5pm, The Nation still has not retracted nor corrected their seriously erroneous report.

************************************

During the 2004 Boxing Day Tsunami, it's interesting that the flow of news was almost the reverse order. The internet picked it up first, then belatedly, the Thai radio and TV news broke the story, several hours after the event.

Part of the problem is that the major Thai news services (print and electronic media) do not invest significan resources in Isaan, and news flows very slowly from that area. It's probably considered the least important area of Thailand after Bangkok, Chiang Mai, and tourist venues. Definitely, off the beaten track.

[sydneyjed]

all concerts, from rock to religious ones, are a danger to revellers. It's not the first grenade and not the last one, to explode in the middle of a crowd.

You are spot on the money there mate..remember the Reggae festival at Cha-Am last year?..One guy got his arm sliced off in a so called gang dispute and then of course The infamous AutoAlliance workers Christmas Party at Chonburi this last December where 30 people were seriously injured when management started handing out prizes to some of the 4000 employees and first beer bottles were thrown then gun fire and then someone let off one these bloody 'home made' grenades..."We have incidents like this every year" said a policeman who declined to be identified....<deleted>!!!!

[lavender19]

All this news -which changes by the minute - comes from the Nation Newspaper. They <Snip!> up big time! Try the Bangkok Post!

My god you mentioned The Bangkok Post on here.Have you had a slapped wristt and made to sit in the corner yet?

Edited February 25, 2013 by lavender19

[vijer]

NAKHON PHANOM: -- Four policemen and two bystanders were killed when a grenade exploded during an annual festival of this northeastern province late Sunday night.

4+2=6

Please learn to read, it says "4 People", only the BiB are classified as people.

Edited February 25, 2013 by vijer

[Mr Yim]

Mrs Yim went for a massage in nearby Yang Sisurat. The previous client was a policemans wife and was not too far from the incident. Apparently, the guy was openly wearing a grenade around his neck like a necklace. A member of the public brought this to the attention of the police, who questioned him as to whether it was a live grenade or a fake. At that point he pulled the pin!

I went to the Stupa this evening and the Morlam stage has been removed leaving all of the food stalls around the arena with no customers. Notwithstanding this, there were still many thousands of people at the festival tonight. It is worth a visit if you are not too far away.

[ableguy]

Why do you armchair idiots spout so much trite crap, death is involved with bereaved families, no bread winner, no lover, no dad no mum. go back to where you came from.

[ableguy]

Its all about education or the lack of it. These teenagers simply do not think about the consequences of their actions. The police fully expect trouble as there check points on the routes into Na Dun, where the police stop and presumably search the teenagers going to the festival. Last year my ride on the dodgems with my step son was interupted whilst a couple of Tom Boys were fighting. It seems to be accepted and nothing is done about it.

The reason being no person here accepts resposability for their own action, that covers Thailand

[bobbysan124]

Sorry about fatalities and injuries. Glad it wasn't what it could've been.

[saroq]

How do these types of people get access to a grenade? Perhaps a review of how the military secure their weapons is needed.

[seatimes]

Duh, Nadoon is in Mahasarakham

[patongphil]

Word on the "rice vine" is that there were actually 8 people killed but it was being hushed up. We were there during the morning and were gone by noon. The stupa is pretty impressive as too the devotion shown by many of the people visiting. The stalls and show ground stuff is just same same every village market albeit a bit bigger but not really worth hanging around for.

[Commander Tamson]

Another grenade. Surely the government / army should target eliminating the availablity of these? You can't buy them in Big C ( I don't think ) so where do they come from? Army personnel supplementing their income ?

Not to appear frivolous, but there's a clue in this story http://isaannews.com/udon-thani-border-police-lose-weapons/

I loved the quote in the article ”We believe some officials are involved in corruption,” Oh really?

[Fookhaht]

Video taken just following the blast:

Seems to download faster at this facebook page, if you can access it: http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=122496931265993

Interesting that the same day, CNN reports a blast in Afghanistan killing one person, and writes up a significant article on the event. Four people killed in Isaan and scores injured, and nothing on the international news services. Is this news being suppressed?

[Fookhaht]

More details continue to emerge....

Grenade blast at temple festival kills four, injures 58

Anek Krajam

The Nation, Maha Sarakham February 26, 2013 1:00 am

A grenade explosion rocked the Phra That Na Dun Festival in Maha Sarakham province late on Sunday night, killing three people and injuring 58 others.

As of press time, 29 of the injured remained hospitalised, while five - including the man who allegedly brought the M67 grenade to the event - were under intensive care.

Full article here.