CityNews – In March 2017 two geologists, Pratyawat Wasu-anant and Pathomporn Siriwat, died at Mae Ngat-Mae Kuang diversion tunnel project site due to the collapse of a tunnel under construction.
This project by the Irrigation Department Chiang Mai Office is under contract to the Italian-Thai Development PLC. The company reportedly offered to pay the family of the casualties 500,000 baht each but the deal was not accepted as they believed that the incident was due to the negligence of safety standards by the company.
On January 17th this year, mothers of the two geologists reportedly filed a lawsuit against the company. They revealed that after the incident they have received a mere 15,000 baht each for funeral costs with no other support. The total figure of the compensation for damage is at 46,879,607.17 baht. Wasu-anant’s family revealed that after the death of their son, they have been struggle both emotionally and financially as he was the main pilar of the family and was paying for his brother’s tuition.