Bang Kruai District, Thailand: On Friday morning, Nanchanatporn Nakplang got up, made breakfast and went to work as usual at Debsirin Nonthaburi School. She had been a teacher for eight years and attended the school herself as a girl.
By 10am, she was dead, killed by a 14-year-old gunman in a mass shooting that has rocked Thailand.
The following afternoon, her body was laid out in a nearby Buddhist temple, where hundreds of mourners lined up to take holy water from a receptacle beside her. They were fellow teachers, neighbours, students and alumni. Teenagers and adults wept.
“This was a teacher who was loved by her students,” said Chawinthon Udomchaidate, an 18-year-old former student who had Kanun, as she was nicknamed, for Thai language lessons.
Kanun, in her early 30s, was one of five teachers killed at Debsirin Nonthaburi School, on the north-western fringes of Bangkok, in Thailand’s worst mass shooting since 2022.
The school announced on Saturday afternoon, shortly after Kanun’s funeral service, that year 7 girl Naphat Chaima had also succumbed to her wounds in hospital.
The shooter was year 9 student Patchata Yimruang, who, relatives told Thai media, liked to keep to himself and spent his spare time playing video games.
His father emerged from the nearby Plai Bang Police Station after an interview with investigators on Sunday. Fighting through the crowd of journalists and cameramen to get to his car, he offered only a couple of words in Thai.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
Thailand has high gun ownership rates and a recent history of mass shootings, but not in schools or by students.
The Debsirin Nonthaburi School shooting may prove Thailand’s Port Arthur moment, with Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul pledging to review the nation’s gun laws.
Yimruang’s shooting spree began at home before dawn on Friday when he fatally shot his grandfather in the back and his grandmother while she was still in bed. He had lived with them since the age of two after his parents’ separation.
Locking the door behind him, Yimruang arrived at school at 6.20am as usual and participated in the flag-raising assembly.
Shortly before 10am, as the second school period drew to a close, he produced from his bag the same 9mm handgun he had used to kill his grandparents and opened fire.
Yimruang moved through the hallways shooting at teachers and students before turning the gun on himself as police formed a cordon around the multi-storey building’s perimeter.
In addition to the dead, close to 30 people were injured, including students, in the gunfire or frantic escape that had some hiding on ledges outside upper-floor windows.
Police later found a drawing of a gun at the boy’s home and evidence on his computer that he had been watching online videos of mass shootings from America.
It has also emerged that Yimruang last year brought a BB gun to school, for which he was disciplined.
Police still do not have a motive, although they have speculated that he had been under pressure from his grandparents and teachers about his school performance.
Police Major General Atthaporn Anusit spoke to reporters on Sunday at Plai Bang Police Station, but had little to offer the press pack.
“After investigation and interrogation with various people, we believe there are many related factors combined,” he said.
“I want to pass on the message to anyone taking care of the youth: We must listen to them. Focus on problem-solving. Sometimes we may ignore them, but now with social media, they can access content on their own … we have to keep a closer look on the youth.”
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