Not Quite the news
The end of Thongchai Tor Silachai's professional boxing career may be good news for the Corrections Department.
The career of the famous muay Thai boxer, whose real name is Thongchai Pakthai, came to an end on Thursday when he was arrested by Nakhon Ratchasima police carrying 85 methamphetamine pills, only days before his next professional bout.
He admitted to police that the decline in prize money from boxing played a part in his decision to make some extra money by selling the drug to young people in the northeastern province.
But while his professional boxing career may be over, an opportunity lies ahead for him to redeem his reputation.
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| The mangled wreckage of a pick-up truck after its crash with a Bangkok-bound train at a railway crossing in Nakhon Ratchasima on Monday. — PRASIT TANGPRASERT |
Corrections Department chief Wanchai Roujanawong wants Thongchai to become a trainer and work with other prisoners and former inmates who want to change their lives and become boxers.
''The department has a policy of utilising skilled prisoners for the benefit of their fellow inmates,'' he said.
In Thongchai's case, Mr Wanchai said he is confident his presence in the prison will lure other inmates to take up boxing and boost the popularity of the department's boxing camp.
The department already turned female inmate Siriporn Thaveesuk into a star after she won the WBC light flyweight title, and now her story is set to become a Hollywood film.
The department may now produce more champions with the experienced Thongchai as a trainer.
Deadly loud music
Music can kill. But by the time Narongrit Nuring learned this lesson, it was too late.
The 35-year-old was driving his pick-up truck through Muang district in Nakhon Ratchasima with the stereo turned up full volume. The music was so loud that as he drove up to a railway crossing at Soi Mitthaphab 22 he didn't hear the oncoming Ubon Ratchathani-Bangkok train, which slammed into his vehicle.
The accident was reported on the police radio network and rescue workers rushed to the scene, finding the impact had caused severe damage, killing the driver and badly damaging both the pick-up truck and the train. Police could only identify the victim from a bank book found inside the truck, according to Pol Lt-Col Thawatchai Sroisasadi of the Pho Klang station.
The accident damaged the locomotive and passengers had to wait for a new engine to be bought in to haul the train on to its final destination.
A construction worker who witnessed the accident said he saw the car and heard very loud music playing before it tried to cross the railway tracks and was hit by the oncoming train.
It was the fourth accident this year at the same crossing, with Narongrit becoming the fifth victim so far.
Accidents at railway crossings have increased over the past two years from 185 in 2006 to 327 last year.
When asked about car accidents at the crossings, then SRT governor Chitsanti Dhanasobhon offered one valuable tip to motorists: ''Don't underestimate the speed of our trains.''
A stomach bug
Grasshoppers are fighting back.
Duang-orn Konkaew was rushed to the Khao Hin Sorn health clinic in Chachoengsao on Wednesday, five minutes after eating fried grasshoppers at home with her family.
Soon after her meal she started having difficulty breathing, showed signs of an allergic reaction and had a slowing pulse, her worried husband Sompote said. Mr Sompote, 40, decided to rush her to get medical help at tambon Khao Hin Sorn.
Charuayporn Punchareon, a health official at Khao Hin Sorn, said the grasshopper she had eaten may have contained some dangerous chemicals which are sprayed on cash crops.
Mr Sompote and his 26-year-old wife had earlier joined 40 other villagers who travelled in a convoy of pick-up trucks on a grasshopper-catching expedition to a deserted area behind the Khao Laem factory. After catching enough grasshoppers for everyone, they returned to their village and fried the catch for dinner.
''Everybody in the village ate them and they had no problem except my wife,'' he said, insisting that the grasshoppers they cooked were the same as those he saw at food stalls.
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