As a deadly 7.7 magnitude earthquake struck Myanmar on Friday, over 1,000 km away from the epicenter, in Thailand’s capital city of Bangkok, collapsed one 33-storey under construction high-rise building.
Thailand’s deputy prime minister Anutin Charnvirakul, who visited the collapse site on Saturday, ordered a rapid investigation into the incident, stirring curiosity among many as to what went wrong with the skyscraper, which was being constructed by a joint venture that included a Chinese firm.
This 33-storey high-rise building, despite having been dotted with cranes, collapsed in the intense quake shake. So far, eight bodies have been recovered from the debris of the skyscraper.
Questions over how and why the skyscraper collapsed so quickly have begun to do the rounds. Prof Suchatchavee Suwansawas, a civil engineer and politician from the Democrat Party, told The Telegraph UK that something was “definitely” wrong.
“You see all other buildings, even high-rise buildings under construction, they are safe. So either the design was wrong or construction was wrong, but it’s too soon to reach conclusions,” he noted.
Constructed over 3 years
The collapsed building reportedly was the unfinished headquarters of the Thailand’s State Audit Office (SAO) and had been under construction for three years, at a cost of more than two billion Thai baht (around $58 million).
It was a joint venture between Italian-Thai Development Plc and China Railway Number 10 (Thailand) Ltd. The latter company is a subsidiary of a Chinese firm named China Railway Number 10 Engineer Group Company, holding 49 per cent of shares, the largest amount of stake foreign entities can hold in a Thai company, The Telegraph UK reported.
