Thread: Man dies in front of Scampy on escalator

I had a late lunch at the S&P below Phantip Plaza as I waited for the nerds on level 4 to fix my hard drive and rescue all my data. Incedentally I didn't leave a tip for the obsequious S&P staff because they charged me for a bottle of water I didn't ask for.

Back in Phantip I started the ascent to level 4, and it was whilst taking the escalator up to level 3 that an elderly Indian couple fell backwards almost hitting me, this is a long way to fall for an old couple and I rushed to the top of the escalator to locate the red button but some Thai's who had been in front of the couple got in the way as the bodies reached the top of the escalator and tried to move the man onto normal ground.

The old woman was in a state of shock trying to gather her husbands glasses and bits from her handbag that were dancing against the teeth as the stairs dissapeared, pulling her sari with them.

People were piling up at the top trying to squeeze past the old Indian man and I finally located the button which was at ground level and under a perspex flap.

Security arrived and cut the womans sari free from the teeth, crowds gathered and people ran out from their shop units to try and help.
Nobody could revive the man and I could see his tounge turning blue, he had no pulse. A couple of the Thais tried CPR and mouth to mouth, no idea if they knew what they were doing, the poor woman was shaking like a leaf and couldn't stand up. He had no pulse and was slowly changing colour.

As they ripped his shirt open I noticed a vertical scar in the middle of his chest and it became apparent that he must have had a heart attack half way up the escalator and fell backwards taking his wife with him.

Eventually medics arrived and failed to revive him, he died at the scene long before. I felt pretty useless and especially sorry for the Indian woman who showed no distress or panic, just quiet confused shock.

I feel very sorry for her, now widowed and in a foreign country having just lost her husband of 50 or more years. Shortly before as I'd been in S&P they were probably discussing their grandchildren or business and in the blink of an eye her life partner, who's companionship had outlived any of my own memories, vanished in an instant, on an escalator in the middle of a computer mall in Bangkok.

Just goes to show it can all be over in an instant, though personally I would like a bit of notice before my own inevetable demise.