Man found adrift in sea with dead body of friend rescued off Rayong

The fisherman, Boonchit Suwanchote, 44, told police that he had headed out to the sea at 4am to retrieve crab nets he had set up around 5 nautical miles from the shore.

He spotted the survivor at 5am, drifting near his nets. Both the survivor and the body were wearing life jackets, Boochit recounted.

He rescued the engineer and retrieved the body and headed back ashore and called the police station.

The survivor was identified as Ang, a Thai-Chinese man, who works as an engineer at a power plant in Samut Prakan province.

The dead man was only identified as Lee, a 39-year-old Taiwanese man who was the manager of the power plant where Ang works.

After police and rescuers from a foundation reached the village, they rushed the survivor to the district hospital.

Boonchit said he had learned from the survivor that he, his wife and the dead man were on a vacation on Koh Mun Klang. The survivor and the manager rowed a kayak to Koh Mun Nai at noon. Their kayak overturned at around 3pm and both tried to drift to survive but the manager developed muscle cramps and drowned. The survivor then clung on to the body and kept drifting until the morning.

Ang told police that he and his wife and the manager had travelled together to Koh Mun Klang on Sunday.

Police said Ang’s wife had reported to Tourist Police on Sunday that the two had gone missing after they rowed the kayak out to Koh Mun Nai together.

Local police had coordinated with several agencies, including the Tambon Sunthornphu Municipality, to look for the two before calling off the search operation at 9pm.