Human Interest

Thailand says goodbye to boy rescued from cave who died in UK

Bangkok, Mar 7 (EFE).- Family and friends of Duangpetch Promthep, one of the 13 survivors of a famed rescue mission from a cave in Thailand, scattered the ashes of the boy Tuesday, after he died last month in the United Kingdom.

A religious ceremony was held in the town of Mae Sai, near the cave from where he was rescued in 2018 along with his soccer teammates, with about 100 attendees. The 17 year old’s ashes were scattered in the Mekong river.

Ten soccer balls, with condolence messages written by other of the rescued boys, were thrown into the river along with the ashes, public broadcasted Thai PBS reported.

The boy, who was studying in the English town of Leicester on a scholarship from the Zico Foundation of Thailand, died on Feb. 14, two days after being found unconscious in his bedroom and admitted to hospital.

According to British authorities, the minor suffered a severe blow to the head that caused his death, although the circumstances of the accident – classified as “not suspicious” – have not been specified.

Funeral rites for Promthep began in England, where his body was cremated, and his remains arrived Sunday in Thailand, where a series of prayers were held.

Promthep was 13 when, on Jun. 23, 2018, he and his 11 to 16-year-old classmates and their 26-year-old guardian wandered into a cave in the northern province of Chiang Rai after soccer training, and were tracked down nine days later four kilometers from the entrance.

All of them were rescued in a complicated international rescue operation through the partially flooded galleries of the cave, which was completed 17 days later and in which one of the divers died.

After the rescue, the cave became a point of pilgrimage with between 1,000 and 3,000 daily visitors.

The dramatic rescue was brought to movie theaters through the movie “The Cave” and streaming platform Netflix released a six-episode miniseries last year about the event. EFE

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