Avalanche Of Recycled Paper Kills Sleeping Guard

Avalanche of recycled paper kills sleeping guard

KHON KAEN: A security guard at a recycling business in Khon Kaen was found crushed to death under 2,000 tonnes of recycled paper yesterday.

Preliminary investigations in-dicated that security guard, Sommai Wongsithep, 46, who worked at Khon Kaen Wongpanit Co in Khon Kaen’s Muang district, went to sleep on a stack of paper bundles weighing up to 800kg each, Pol Capt Therttoon Soisukhapapan said.

Mechanic Prajuap Matpang, 36, who discovered the body, said he

and about 10 other employees arrived for work at 8am and found heaps of paper on the floor. He noticed one of Sommai’s legs after

two bundles of paper were picked up by a forklift truck.

Sommai’s wife, Jomthong Wongsithep, said she went to the factory to look for her husband at 7am after he did not return home at his usual time of 6.15am.

“My husband had been working at the recycling plant for one month. He was a good man and served in the military as a draftee. He was not supposed to have been asleep on duty,” she said.

Dr Thitichai Wiangsimma, of Srinakharin University hospital, said death occurred six hours before the body was discovered and was caused by suffocation.

--The Nation 2004-03-10