SONGKHLA — Netizens are heaping a mailman with praise Thursday for coming to the rescue of medics who couldn’t locate the home of a patient they were dispatched to retrieve.
Thailand Post employee Saranpat Paengsri, 24, found the rescuers on June 21 just as they were lost in Khao Rup Chang subdistrict. Saranpat eventually led the ambulance to the home of a man who was suffering from heart failure.
The team had been struggling to find the man’s location because of the neighborhood’s many soi. After receiving directions from Saranpat, the ambulance appeared take wrong turns, so Saranpat intervened and guided the medics to the correct address on his motorcycle.
The patient was safely delivered to the hospital thanks to Saranpat’s help, rescue worker Boonrit Thongkert said.
“If I drove there by myself, I would’ve gotten lost,” Boonrit recalled. “And what’s important is the patient had a heart condition. He already felt pain in his chest. If we got there later than we did, his condition would have been worse.”
Saranpat’s story went viral after one of the rescue workers posted about his experience earlier this week, winning the postman much admiration on social media. Speaking to a reporter today, Saranpat said he had been working in the area for two years so knows every street and house by heart.
“Officials and people often ask me for directions,” the postman said. “If they still don’t know the way, I volunteer to guide them.”
Saranpat advised other commuters to ask local mailmen for help when lost.
Despite occasional mishaps, Thai postmen are well known for their intimate knowledge of local addresses, with their skills in locating the right address sometimes going viral.
In January, a woman received a play ticket from Britain in her mailbox even though a printing error removed all Thai script from the address, leaving only several numbers intact.
After drawing much amazement on social media, Thailand Post said the mailman managed to track down the right home because he remembered the address had previously received packages from overseas.