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Journalism of Courage
A Karnataka man – who landed in Bangkok on a business trip just hours before a high-magnitude earthquake struck the Thailand capital on Friday – shared his experience with The Indian Express over the phone.
“I was heading to sleep and, all of a sudden, the building started to violently swing sideways. It felt like the entire building was on a swing. I rushed to the emergency exit, where some of my friends had also gathered. We rushed down to save our lives,” said the earthquake survivor and Bengaluru resident Mahesh M, 43, who was staying on the 22nd floor of the 26-floor-high hotel.
Meanwhile, a video of the hotel where Mahesh M was staying has gone viral. The video shows water from a rooftop swimming pool spilling down the multi-storied building onto the ground.
Mahesh M, who had not experienced an earthquake before, said, “I did not know how to react.”
He further said that he and his friends were shifted to another hotel following the earthquake. “Three hours after the incident, the hotel staff informed us that the pillars and the foundation of the building had not been affected and gave us the choice to shift or to stay in the same building,” Mahesh added.
Raju, a Karnataka native who has been running a business in Thailand’s Pattaya for the last 39 years, said, “There were no tremors or any effect (in Pattaya). But a lot of people were stuck in Bangkok, and road services have been massively hit.”
An under-construction high-rise building collapsed in Bangkok during the Friday afternoon quake, killing three people and injuring several others. The Thailand capital has been declared an ‘emergency zone’ following the quake.
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