Social media helped survivors track killer

In a toilet at Thailand's Terminal 21 mall shoppers jammed cubicle doors against the entrance to keep out a Thai soldier on a shooting spree, tracing his movements through fragments of CCTV passed on by friends on the outside.

Barricaded in with a few dozen others, Chanathip Somsakul, a 33-year-old music teacher, and his wife poured through social media and made frantic calls to friends and family, police, mall workers, nurses. They were with their three-year-old daughter.

"A friend who works at the mall was talking to a guy in the CCTV control room he gave us updates on the location of the gunman," Chanathip said.

Those details shared over messaging apps may have saved the lives of Chanathip, his family and the 20 to 30 others inside.

But in the swirl of competing information, dread gripped those hiding in cupboards, storerooms and toilets.

"Everyone was terrified and lost. There was so much information going around, people weren't sure what to believe," Chanathip added.

For hours the killer - identified as sergeant-major Jakrapanth Thomma - stalked the concourses, the glass-fronted windows of the multilevel mall.

A soldier with a personal grudge, Jakrapanth had already slain several people on his way to the mall, which was packed on the first day of a long weekend.

Officials said Jakrapanth first killed two people on a military base and then went on a shooting rampage as he drove to the mall.

In full view of security cameras, the soldier swaggered through the mall, a machine gun slung over his shoulder, helmet on and in combat gear.

By the end of his spree at least 27 people would be dead - himself included. Many more were wounded, several critically. At least two were undergoing brain surgery.

Sharpshooters brought an end to the 17-hour-ordeal when they killed the gunman yesterday morning after a night which seesawed between exchanges of gunfire and terrifying dashes for exits by shoppers.

"It is unprecedented in Thailand and I want this to be the last time this crisis happens," Thailand's Prime Minister Prayut Chan-O-Cha said. Prayut, a former army chief, blamed a "personal problem" over the sale of a house for the soldier's rampage, which began on Saturday afternoon near an army barracks and was for several hours relayed by the gunman via Facebook posts.

The attacker used a stolen M60 machine gun and rifles as well as a military humvee to carry out the attack.

Video taken outside the mall showed people diving for cover as shots rang out on Saturday afternoon.

Many were killed outside the mall, some in cars, others while walking.

According to local media, Jakrapanth worked at an army base close to Nakhon Ratchasima, which is about 250 kilometers from Bangkok.

He was a sharpshooter and took many special courses on carrying out attacks, including planning ambushes, army sources said.

Evacuees recounted how an ordinary Saturday descended into horror.

"It was like a dream ... I'm grateful I survived," Sottiyanee Unchalee, 48, said, explaining she hid in the toilet of a gym inside the mall.

Filipino teacher Aldrin Baliquing said he was ushered into a storeroom by staff.

"We were there for six grueling hours I'm in shock," he said.

Another survivor said the shooter was aiming" for the heads. "He was shooting everywhere and his shots were very precise," said the man.

Hours before he began shooting, Jakrapanth had posted on his Facebook account denouncing greedy people.

"Rich from cheating. Taking advantage of other people. Do they think they can spend the money in hell?" read one post.

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