Pattaya police received a call at 5:30pm on the 18th of February that a fire had broken out at the Max Muay Thai stadium at 42 Sukhumvit road, the police immobilized the relevant emergency services and firefighters rushed to the scene.
On arrival they found the building encompassed with flames, with huge plumes of black smoke filling the sky. By standers stated that the fire had started near the back of the building but had quickly spread towards the front.
Luckily the premises was not yet open but would have been dealing with busloads of Chinese tourists at 7pm that same evening.
It took 10 firetrucks over one hour to extinguish the flames and four members of staff including a manager suffered burns and smoke inhalation and were transported to the local hospital for medical treatment.
The entire building except for a small part of the façade and metal structures were completely destroyed by the fire and the company director Mr. Nawat Thaochareonsuk looked on as his 200 million baht project was left in ruins.
He informed the police that a team of electricians were servicing the air conditioning units in the afternoon and that a loud bang was heard, he assumed that a compressor had exploded which was responsible for starting the fire.
Deputy Mayor Ronakit Eakasingh, was at the scene as well said that at present there was no concrete information as to what actually caused the fire, but said that the first point of order was to ensure that the area was cordoned off as there are fears that the remains of the building could collapse.
The Max Muay Thai Stadium was constructed under a budget of 200 million baht and was only opened in November 2014 under the management of Mr. Nawat Thaochareeonsuk and Mr. Piyachart Srichan as managing partners. The stadium is hi-tech, had many facilities.
An investigation will now take place to determine the cause of the fire.
