Man fires gun into air at Thai school as his first-grade child can't read

A father fired two shots into the air at a rural primary school in northeastern Thailand on Nov. 2, angry that his first-grade child still could not read or do basic sums, police said.

The father, a 54-year-old Sikhio district resident named Manachai, was drunk and shouting at Ban Na Di Si Sa-at School in Kut Noi subdistrict, Nakhon Ratchasima province, before he fired a .38-caliber handgun into the air, Thairath reported. Teachers and parents panicked, and police were alerted.

He had come to pick his child up and quarreled with a teacher over the child's progress before losing his temper, the newspaper said, citing a preliminary investigation.

Pol. Col. Thatchaphon Chinnawong, superintendent of the Sikhio police station, said the man fired two shots but no one was hurt and nothing was damaged, the Bangkok Post reported.

The man then fled in a pickup truck to a public area in the village, where police caught up with him, arrested him and seized the handgun he allegedly used, Thatchaphon said.

Pol. Maj. Gen. Narongsak Phromtha, the Nakhon Ratchasima provincial police chief, said officers initially charged the man with illegal possession of a firearm and ammunition, carrying a firearm in public without reasonable cause and driving while intoxicated, Thairath reported. Police took him into custody to be brought before the Sikhio Provincial Court.

The man told police he had personal problems and was unhappy with the school's teaching, Narongsak said, describing the incident as a momentary loss of temper.

Narongsak urged schools to stay alert and to report anyone acting suspiciously or showing a tendency toward violence. Police are working with local schools to rehearse responses to violent incidents and have assigned officers to oversee safety and traffic when pupils are dropped off and picked up, he said.

Pupils in a classroom at a school in northern Thailand. Illustration photo by Unsplash/Mario Heller

The school, with about 30 pupils and seven teachers, lies away from the main community and is largely surrounded by forest, the Bangkok Post reported.

The incident came less than three months after a 14-year-old student killed five teachers and a student at Debsirin Nonthaburi School on Bangkok's outskirts, having first killed his grandparents at home, Khaosod English reported. He died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound.