The death toll from a school shooting in Thailand climbed to nine on Saturday after a 12-year-old girl succumbed to critical wounds she suffered the previous day, when a 14-year-old student opened fire at his school northwest of Bangkok and then took his own life. The attack at Debsirin Nonthaburi School in Nonthaburi province — a densely populated area bordering the Thai capital — also left 14 people hospitalised, seven of them in critical condition. Most of those wounded were between 12 and 14 years old.
The alleged shooter began his rampage on Friday morning by killing his two grandparents at their home, where he lived, before travelling to the school and opening fire at around 10 a.m. He fired at least 26 bullets using a gun legally registered to his grandfather — a small, compact weapon — and was found with 34 additional rounds of ammunition. Five members of school staff were among the dead. Relatives of eight victims collected their bodies from Bangkok's Institute of Forensic Medicine for transport to their hometowns; forensic officials said most victims suffered a single fatal gunshot wound to the chest or head. Toxicology results are expected later. There were reports the boy had shown signs of stress related to school, though some relatives said they had been unaware of any difficulties he faced.
The co-educational state school, which enrols around 3,000 students aged 12 to 18, suspended all classes from 10 to 14 August. A lockdown was declared over within roughly half an hour of the attack, with images showing students evacuating in their socks. On Saturday, a small number of mourners laid flowers at the school gate, and some parents returned with their children to collect belongings left behind during the chaos. One father said his son, who was present during the shooting, remained in shock and could not sleep alone.
Thailand's prime minister, Anutin Charnvirakul, pledged to introduce new gun legislation, saying only government officials on duty would be permitted to carry firearms, though he offered no specific details on whether ownership requirements would be tightened. The announcement comes against a backdrop of persistently high civilian gun ownership: Thailand has the highest rate of gun possession in Southeast Asia, with an estimated ten million firearms in circulation — roughly one for every seven residents — and ranks 13th globally according to a widely cited 2017 Small Arms Survey.
The attack is the deadliest in Thailand since 2022, when a former police officer killed 36 people, including 24 children, at a nursery in the country's northeast. A 14-year-old was accused of a 2023 shooting at a major Bangkok shopping mall, and in February this year a teenager opened fire at a school in southern Thailand, killing one person and wounding two others. Critics note that previous promises to strengthen gun laws have failed to prevent a pattern of high-profile shooting incidents from continuing.