10.02.2026

Dual fatality in boom incident

Two people died yesterday, after the boom lift they were working from broke through a concrete floor into the basement below.

The two, a married couple, aged 27 and 32, were working together for a subcontractor, carrying out electrical and air conditioning work as part of the renovations to a gymnasium in the Trang Thung Chaeng / Municipal Stadium in the city of Trang, due south of Phuket, on the Malay Peninsula of Southern Thailand.

They were working from the platform of a Genie Z-80/60 articulated boom lift at the time, at a height of around five or six metres, when one or more of the pre-cast concrete floor beams broke, causing others to fail, and create a hole large enough for the machine to drop through into the level below.

The catapult effect threw the couple out of the platform to the ground below. We do not know if they were harnessed in or not at the time. Paramedics quickly arrived on the scene and tried to resuscitate them, but sadly, both died enroute to or shortly after arrival at the hospital.

The Z-80/60 weighs just over 17 tonnes, and can incur single wheel loadings of eight tonnes or more. Add to this the fact that the tyres were almost certainly poly filled, so the loadings per square inch/square metre are particularly high. One witness report from the scene said that one of the machine’s wheels broke through as a beam gave way, and as the weight was transferred to other wheels, further beams collapsed.

Initial inspections found that the boom lift had been working in the gym since November.