**Suvarnabhumi Airport to open on time
**
Bangkok Post dd. 19 januari 2006
(TNA) - Bangkok’s new Suvarnabhumi International Airport will open for commercial purposes in June 2006 as scheduled despite a fire at a flight catering building of Thai Airways International Public Company Limited (THAI) inside the airport Wednesday evening.
Transport Minister Pongsak Raktapongpaisal made the confirmation when he inspected the building after the fire.
“The fire won’t affect the airport’s commercial services scheduled to be launched in June 2006, as the damaged building is just a part of a business firm located inside the airport,” he told journalists.
The minister said he had instructed officials of THAI and Airports of Thailand Public Co., Ltd. to inspect and assess overall damages caused by the fire, as well as conduct an official investigation on the cause of the fire.
The fire broke out on the first floor of the four-storey building, which is part of the national airline’s operational center on an area of 54,400 square meters inside the airport.
An initial investigation found that the blaze, which caused one worker dead and three other injured, was sparked by a metal welding inside the building.
The dead worker was initially found injured inside an elevator after the fire broke out.
He was sent to Lat Krabang Hospital and was pronounced dead from suffocation Wednesday night.