See story here.
“Sirinath National Park officials would like to inform people that this area [where the object is] must be closed off for security purposes. But other areas are open as normal, such as near the beach road of Nai Yang,” said Sirinath National Park Chief Witoon Dechpramualpol.
“We are not letting people or tourists enter the area. It is a temporary measure for safety,” said Chief Witoon.
“We want to ask the public not to panic. I want to clarify that it is still safe and we have now re-opened most other parts of the park for normal use.
Over 40 officers who came to the scene included Royal Thai Navy Third Area Commander Sombat Saengchaiyapum, Lieutenant Junior Grade (LTJG) Thanakrit Jamjit, Sub-Lt Taksin Pooklim who is the Head of the Peacekeeping Department, Maj Surasak Pungyaem of the 25th Military Circle based at the Royal Thai Army Region 4 headquarters in Nakhon Sri Thammarat, Mr Witoon Dechpramualpol who is Chief of Sirinat National Park, and others.
Despite explosive ordnance experts from the Royal Thai Navy base in Phang Nga “confirming” on Wednesday (Oct 4) that the object is a torpedo, and slating it for destruction with a controlled explosion (see story here), Commander Sombat Saengchaiyapum yesterday expressed his uncertainty that this was the case.
“We cannot yet confirm whether it is an explosive device or a piece of equipment. The object is believed to be a relatively harmless object. But it is not clear what exactly it is, so let’s define it as a suspicious object. The investigation into what exactly the object is will continue,” said Commander Sombat.
“Officials dug the sand around the object for inspection and the part at the end was found to resemble a tail. But from digging deeper, no other parts were found. This took about one hour,” he said.
“We are currently undergoing a joint analysis and evaluation between the Royal Thai Navy Third Area Command and the Naval Ordnance Department,” he said.
“Before we move the object we must know exactly what it is. When it is clear, it will be reported, and we will outline the procedure we will implement to render it safe. This is expected to take about three to four days or maybe within the next week for it to become clear,” he said.