A road in Bangkok collapsed, creating a 50m hole near Vajira Hospital, causing evacuations. Photo / Chanakarn Laosarakham, AFP
A road in Bangkok collapsed, creating a 50m hole near Vajira Hospital, causing evacuations. Photo / Chanakarn Laosarakham, AFP
A portion of a busy road in Thailand’s capital caved in today, leaving a hole dozens of metres deep in front of a main hospital and forcing people nearby to evacuate.
Just outside a local police station and Vajira Hospital in a residential district of Bangkok, a roughly 50mhole pulled down power lines and exposed a burst pipe gushing water, AFP journalists saw.
Dozens of police and city officials cordoned off the site, while a ute teetered precariously on the edge of the hole.
The collapse was linked to heavy rain and a leaky pipe eroding the soil. Photo / Chanakarn Laosarakham, AFP
Suriyachai Rawiwan, director of Bangkok’s disaster prevention department, told AFP at the scene that the collapse was likely linked to recent heavy rain and a leaky pipe.
“There was a leak in the water pipe - water from the pipe eroded [earth] under the road so this incident happened,” he said, adding that there were no known casualties.
“The water that eroded brought some soil that dropped down to an under-construction subway station, causing the collapse,” Suriyachai added.
The tunnel is part of an underground service being built by the state-run Mass Rapid Transit Authority, which said it would investigate the cause of the cave-in.
Suriyachai said the local police station facing the collapsed road was evacuated.
Senior police officer Sayam Boonsom also said he had ordered the evacuation of nearby apartment blocks.
Outpatient services at Vajira Hospital were suspended, and nearby buildings were evacuated. Photo / Chanakarn Laosarakham, AFP
“The location is at a station, and the soil was sucked into the site ... it collapsed,” Bangkok Governor Chadchart Sittipunt told AFP at the scene.
A video posted on social media and verified by AFP shows several people running from a construction area on Samsen Road as the street cracks open and collapses, revealing a water-filled hole.
Vajira Hospital, a teaching facility for one of Thailand’s top medical universities, said in a Facebook post it was suspending outpatient services, adding that they would “resume as soon as possible”.
Noppadech Pitpeng, a 27-year-old hospital staffer who lives in a nearby building, said he was frightened by a rumbling sound that woke him up.
“The sound was like an electricity pole collapsing and my whole flat shook,” he said.
