Boy who survived Thai cave rescue killed in the UK

One of the 12 boys who were rescued from a cave in Thailand in 2018 has died in the UK. His name was Duangpetch Promthep.

People from his home town told the BBC that he was found unconscious in his dorm on Sunday. He was taken to the hospital, where he died on Tuesday.

Since the end of last year, he had been going to a football academy in the UK.

He was the leader of a football team of Thai boys who were stuck in a cave for more than two weeks while exploring in Chiang Rai province.

After the boys were found in the cave, a diver’s light caught his thin, happy face. It was one of the most memorable parts of the amazing rescue.

In August of last year, Promthep, whose teammates call him “Dom,” posted on Instagram that he had won a scholarship to the Brooke House College Football Academy in Leicestershire. This made his teammates happy. He wrote, “Today, my dream has come true.”

Six months after their friend died, they are still sad about it.

His mother told the Wat Doi Wao temple in Chiang Rai, where he grew up, about his death. The team went to the temple often. The post, which had pictures of the football team with monks, said, “May Dom’s soul rest in peace.”

Soon, messages from his teammates started coming in.

“You told me to wait until I saw you play for the national team, and I always thought you would,” wrote Prachak Sutham, one of the boys rescued with Promthep in 2018.

“When we last saw each other before you went to England, I joked that I would have to ask for your autograph when you came back. Sleep well, my dear friend. We will always be a group of 13.”

Titan Chanin Viboonrungruang, another boy, wrote: “Brother, you told me that our football dream would come true. You are one of the people who push me and make me want to get better so I can be like you. If there is a next world, I want to play football with my brother Dom again.”

Before he went to the UK, Promthep went to school at the Vachiralai Bee School in Chiang Mai. He was a huge football fan and used to play for a youth team in Chiang Mai.

His Instagram is full of posts about football, and he often adds the hashtag #footballismylife to them. In January, one of his last posts was a sketch of his “dream team’s football kit,” which had blue and pink stripes on the shirt, shorts, socks, and shoes.