Thai undertaker brings corpse to petrol station to prove fuel need

A worker pumps fuel into a car at a petrol station in Bangkok, Thailand, on Thursday.

Photo: EPA A Thai undertaker’s extreme mission to prove he was not hoarding fuel went viral over the weekend after he brought a coffin containing a body to a petrol station to convince attendants the extra fuel he needed was for cremation, not black market resale.

Thais have been pressed into energy-saving mode by the US-Israel war on Iran, which has throttled oil and gas supplies to much of Asia.

Thailand’s Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul insists there is enough fuel for over three months, while the country’s own refineries are working at maximum capacity to cover the nation’s daily needs.

But panic buying, hoarding and price-gouging has prompted shortages and daily limits on filling up at many petrol stations across the country.

Motorists queue to fill up at a petrol station in Bangkok, Thailand, on March 17 amid the Iran war.

Photo: EPA Perhaps the most radical measure by hard-pressed consumers so far was carried out by an undertaker in Ban Bueng district of Chonburi on Sunday, who live-streamed his desperate bid to convince station attendants that he was not seeking extra supplies to resell on the black market. “After being turned down by the petrol station earlier from filling up, I am returning with the deceased in a coffin along with my gallon tanks,” said the man, identified only as Preecha, 48, pointing his phone to the containers on the live stream.

After attendants again refused his request for 2,000 baht (US$60) of petrol, he urged staff to come to the back of his pickup truck, where he showed them the coffin containing a deceased person awaiting cremation. “Go get your manager … I need this petrol,” he said to the spooked attendants.

Preecha said he had been called to collect the body from a nearby hospital for cremation after it went unclaimed.

A screengrab of the undertaker’s social media video shows the occupied coffin he brought to a petrol station.

Photo: Facebook The video was shared thousands of times across Thai social media, becoming an instant talking point on Monday’s talk shows as well as among social media users in a country nervously watching what the coming days and weeks hold as domestic fuel supplies tighten. “How have we got here as a country?” commented Thongtawee Dankasai on a link shared by one of the nation’s top presenters. “Can you please show the coffin to the prime minister,” quipped another social media user.

A worker

原文链接: 南华早报