A 14-year-old student in Thailand killed his grandparents at home before opening fire at his school near Bangkok on Friday, leaving eight dead and 22 wounded in an attack that has shaken a country struggling with gun violence.
Police said the teenager shot five people dead at the Debsirin Nonthaburi school in the Bang Kruai district of Nonthaburi province, on the northwestern outskirts of Bangkok, then took his own life. The grandparents were killed earlier at the family home. National police spokesperson Trairong Phiwphan confirmed the suspected gunman was a student at the school, though no further details about the teenager were provided. The attacker fired at least 26 bullets from a gun belonging to his grandfather. Police found 34 additional rounds of ammunition on him.
The Thai health department said nine people were in a critical condition. Authorities initially reported six dead. The figure was later revised to five. The Guardian counted 22 wounded, while Al Jazeera reported at least 23 injured.
Emergency worker Kiatikhun Verapongpradith described arriving as the shooting was still underway, and his team treated students with injuries to the back, chest, and arms. They found a male teacher lying dead on an upper floor of the school. In another room, they found a female teacher with wounds to her chest and arm.
A witness told reporters that students hid in a classroom after hearing gunshots from another building before police officers knocked on the door and escorted them safely from the building. Photos circulated by emergency workers showed students streaming out as ambulances operated at the site. In one photo, one person lay on a stretcher outside an ambulance while another was attended to by a medic. One 18-year-old student told Reuters he initially thought the sound was firecrackers or someone banging an object. “I didn’t think it was a gun at first,” he said. “There were many shots: Bang bang bang. Then it went quiet. Then it started again.”
Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul offered his condolences and said he had ordered relevant officials to take care of the victims. Arsit Sampantharat, the permanent secretary of the interior ministry, told PPTV that the suspected shooter had remained inside the school after reports of the attack emerged.
A prestigious school in mourning
The Debsirin Nonthaburi school is part of the Debsirin network, founded by the Thai royal family, and its alumni include prime ministers, scholars, and writers. In the 2025 academic year, the school had about 3,100 students and 147 teachers, according to district authorities.
Images from the scene about an hour after the shooting showed people standing outside the school comforting one another while police and first responders were inside the building. The building appeared to have been secured, though officials had not publicly confirmed the shooter’s status at that point. Students who had been escorted out gathered with family members nearby.
A country’s long struggle with gun violence
Thailand is known to have the highest rate of civilian gun ownership in Southeast Asia, and the Switzerland-based Small Arms Survey in 2017 placed the country 13th globally for small gun possession. Thailand has an estimated 10.3 million firearms, and about 40 percent of them are unregistered, according to Al Jazeera. Gun laws are strict in Thailand, where possession of an illegal firearm carries a prison sentence of up to 10 years, but ownership is high compared with other countries in the region. Laws have tightened after mass shootings in recent years, including a requirement for a medical evaluation for those who want to buy a gun or renew a gun licence.
The country has seen a series of deadly shootings in the past six years, with children among the victims. In February, a teacher was killed and a student injured in southern Thailand’s Hat Yai district after a gunman opened fire at a school. The worst attack by a single perpetrator in Thailand’s recent history took place in October 2022, when a former police officer killed 36 people, including 22 children stabbed as they slept at a daycare centre in Nong Bua Lamphu province in the northeast.
The latest attack was likely to lead to renewed debate over gun controls in Thailand, according to Al Jazeera’s reporting from Bang Kruai.