A British tourist in Thailand’s capital Bangkok has relived the terrifying moment a deadly 7.7-magnitude earthquake hit the country and neighbouring Myanmar, sending people into “horrendous” panic.
Paul Vincent, who is visiting Bangkok from England, was at a streetside bar when the quake struck at lunch time on Friday local time, prompting evacuations across the city.
A second quake, with a magnitude of 6.4, shook the area 12 minutes later.
He saw water from a high-rise rooftop pool slosh over the side of the building, sending people "screaming" and running for safety and Bangkok city hall declaring the capital a disaster area.
Mr Vincent told The Associated Press: "The next thing, everybody came on the street, so there was a lot of screaming and panicking, which obviously made it a lot worse.
"When I saw the building, oh my God, that's when... it hit me.
A 7.7 magnitude earthquake has hit Myanmar, causing a rooftop pool in Bangkok, Thailand, to overflow
— Faizal Mammar (@faizal_mammar) March 28, 2025
🗓️ 28-03-2025 pic.twitter.com/SK5hZfecZx
"There was people crying in the streets and, you know, the panic was horrendous really."
Meanwhile, another British tourist revealed he was in one of Bangkok's malls shopping for camera equipment when he felt the ground shake.
Fraser Morton, from Scotland, recalled: "I got outside and then looked up at the building and the whole building was moving, dust and debris, it was pretty intense.
"All of a sudden the whole building began to move. Immediately there was screaming and a lot of panic.
“I just started walking calmly at first but then the building started really moving, yeah, a lot of screaming, a lot of panic, people running the wrong way down the escalators, lots of banging and crashing inside the mall."
Like Mr Morton, thousands of people poured into Bangkok’s Benjasiri Park from nearby shops and buildings along Bangkok’s busy Sukhumvit Road to seek refuge.
There was people crying in the streets. The panic was horrendous
Meanwhile, a Scottish expat in Bangkok said “blood rushed to his head” as an earthquake shook his apartment building and forced him to flee his property.
Alex MacGregor, a PR consultant who has been living in the Thai capital for the last six months, was working from home and waiting for the delivery of his lunch when the tremors began.
“I was just waiting for the driver to come with my food and I look in the pool and noticed the water started to kind of lap at the edges… but then it started to get violent,” the 36-year-old, originally from Inverness, told the PA news agency.
“All of a sudden I started feeling faint, like that kind of blood rushing to the head feeling, and I was like: ‘Am I ill here, or what’s going on?’
“Then I looked up the other condo, which is a really high skyscraper and I saw their pool water coming over the sides and that’s when I knew it was an earthquake.
“It’s a weird sensation, you’re seeing a lot of things happen in slow motion around you… I actually went and sat down because I was feeling unsteady on my feet.”
Small earthquake in 🇹🇭 pic.twitter.com/bYtgRK9c8S
— Alex MacGregor (@alexmacgregor__) March 28, 2025
Mandy Tang, 38, from London, who was in a movie theatre at the time of the quake, said: “I was watching a film called The Red Envelope. It happened to be quite an action-packed scene when the shake happened, so I initially thought it could have been Imax effects.
“I looked around and none of the local audience left their seats. However, my Taiwanese friend insisted it’s an earthquake, so I walked out of the theatre with her, and we met the security guards coming to evacuate us just outside the theatre.
“We could see the doors were opening and closing, all the chairs were shaking.”
The US Geological Survey said thousands could be dead and the disaster “is likely widespread”.
The UK Foreign Office issued an emergency travel warning for Britons travelling to, or are already in Thailand.
It read: "There has been a 7.7 magnitude earthquake in Myanmar, with strong tremors reported across Thailand and some damage reported to buildings in Bangkok. There may be after-shocks. If you’re in the area or planning to travel there, follow the advice of the local authorities or your tour operator and monitor local media.”
