2 killed, 3 injured in blast in southen Thailand

A blown up electricity pole fell on a truck on Wednesday, killing two solders and injuring three others in Thailand's southern border province of Narathiwat.

The explosion occurred on a local road in Chanae district at around 3:10 p.m. when soldiers and paramilitary rangers riding two vehicles escorted a teacher's car traveling from Ban Ai Krot School to their residences.

Two soldiers were killed instantly in a leading Isuzu pickup truck carrying three officers as the power pole attached with improvised explosive devices snapped and hit the truck.

Other three rangers in the truck were wounded. The teachers in the following car damaged by the power pole were not injured.

Police said the the bomb attached to the power pole was triggered by militants hiding in roadside bushes.

Power poles become targeted to launch small blasts in Narathiwat, one of the three southernmost provinces of Thailand where insurgency is centered. Over 6,500 people died and almost 12, 000 were injured in the past 10 years in a formerly ethnic separatist southern insurgency. Enditem