KHON KAEN: A farmer was electrocuted while putting up an electric fence to protect seedlings in his rice field on Tuesday night, and his son was also killed when he rushed to help him, police said.
Pol Col Yuthana Ngamchad, the Mancha Khiri district station chief, said the field was about one kilometre from Tha Kasem village in tambon Lam Khaen.
Villagers returning home past the rice field stopped to take a look when their dogs kept barking. They saw Prasert Nonpoo, 58, lying unconscious among rice seedlings in the muddy field.
Prasert's son Suksan, 29, was informed and ran to help his father but as soon as he touched him, he too collapsed unconscious.
Police said Prasert was found to have been electrocuted. Suksan was rushed to Mancha Khiri Hospital, where he was also pronounced dead.
Relatives said Prasert usually stayed overnight at a shelter in the rice field.
He was alone there on Tuesday night. Police said he was believed to be stringing an electric wire from the shelter to part of the field being used as a seedlings nursery, for an electric fence to keep out wandering cattle.
It appeared that an open end of the wire accidentally dropped onto a live electric contact at the shelter and Prasert, who was standing in water, was electrocuted.
His son was electrocuted trying to help him.