A 60-year-old Japanese businessman was killed yesterday when he drove his Honda CRV car off a parking building and plunged four floors onto a concrete fence.
A 60-year-old Japanese businessman was killed yesterday when he drove his Honda CRV car off a parking building and plunged four floors onto a concrete fence.
Police and rescue workers rushed to the 34-storey Kallista Mansion on Sukhumvit Soi 11 at 12.30pm to find the car lying overturned on top of the apartment's fence, along with a large section of the fourth-floor parking wall. The car was nearly split in half crosswise.
On the driver's seat was the body of Tadaaki Okada of Eva Trading, an importer of clothing and furniture.
Rescue workers took three hours to cut through the wreckage and pull his body out. He reportedly died from a broken neck and multiple broken bones.
Inspection of the fourth floor found that three parking spaces had been turned into a carwash section with a slope to drain the water.
Housekeeper Chanwiranya Risa, 30, said Okada, who had lived at the apartment with his wife for seven or eight years, told her he would bring his car around for her to wash.
When she turned to prepare her carwash supplies, she heard a loud crash and went to see Okada's car resting on the fence below.
Police suspect this was an accident, as the man might have gunned his engine to get his car up the slope into the carwash slot but overdid it, ploughing through the low wall and falling down. They did not rule out suicide.
Police would contact the victim's relatives to find out more about what had happened.
A source said residents at the apartment recalled two similar occasions when cars over-accelerated, crashing into the wall but then getting stuck on it without going out the other side.