British grandmother blacks out and walks around naked for four hours in a Thai hotel after drinking ‘spiked’ whiskey and coke drink bucket

A British grandmother claims she blacked out and wandered around her hotel naked for hours after drinking alcohol from a ‘spiky’ bucket in Thailand.

Janet West, 61, recalled her harrowing ordeal in Bangkok, amid ongoing investigations into the deaths of six tourists in nearby Laos. It is believed to be a mass incident of methanol poisoning from shots and drink buckets.

The mother-of-two from Swansea, Wales, celebrated the Thai New Year on the city’s famous Khaosan Road, drinking what she thought was whiskey and coke from a bucket.

She said that after going to bed she thought she dreamed that she was being escorted to her room by hotel staff.

But later she discovered it wasn’t a dream; they told her she had been wandering around naked for four hours.

“I was lucky that I survived and had no side effects, but I am now afraid to drink the local liquor in Thailand,” said Janet.

‘The local alcohol is not distilled properly and although it is cheap, it is not worth the risk: stick to imported spirits or bottled beer.’

Janet, now retired, visited Thailand for the local New Year celebrations in April 2019 and has been traveling the world alone since 2022, but says the incident has made her rethink drinking in the region.

Janet, who previously worked in the army and in a bar, said she was visiting the country again in 2023 but now rarely drinks there.

Recalling the night she suspects she was poisoned, she says she was later told by staff that shortly after she went to sleep, she walked out of the room she shared with her boyfriend naked.

She later recalled thinking she was a pregnant teenager and needed to be transported to a special delivery unit.

She came to when hotel staff noticed she was trying to leave the building and escorted her back to her room, she was later told.

She said: ‘On that visit we bought buckets of whiskey and coke, but I have no idea what we actually drank.

“Afterwards, people told me it was ethanol because of the incomplete distillation process.”

She said other tourists had warned her about people dying or going blind after drinking from the buckets of cheap liquor.

‘It’s very difficult because in Thailand the injections are just poured into your neck.

“They just knock on your door and shout ‘free shots,’ and no one questions them.

Janet told the staff that she was probably drinking drinks containing ethanol that night.

“I feel so sad for the unfortunate travelers in Laos, and so disgusted for the people who made and sold the alcohol.”

Six people, including a British student, died after swallowing drinks believed to be laced with methanol – a cheap, toxic substance used to infuse alcoholic drinks with ‘large quantities’.

Simone White, 28, from Orpington, Kent, died in November after taking injections believed to contain methanol at a hostel in Laos.

Sue White, mother of the British victim, told The Sun how the hostel offered free shots of whiskey or vodka for two hours every evening.

When questioned, hostel manager Duong Duc Toan and bartender Toan Van Vanng denied diluting their alcohol with methanol.

Toan said he purchased the alcohol from a certified distributor and free shots of Tiger Vodka were served to about 100 guests.

He said he had not yet received any complaints from other backpackers who had received injections that night.

He also drank from one of the vodka bottles in use that night to prove it was safe.

But Mrs White said her ‘friendly, cheerful’ daughter and friends each took ‘six shots’, watered down with Sprite, before becoming ill and having ‘difficulty breathing’.

She told The Sun how Simone and two friends took themselves to hospital the day after but were ‘discharged’ by medics, who told them they had food poisoning.

By the time an ambulance arrived to take them to a private facility, Simone was already “delirious,” her mother said, adding, “I think it had actually affected all her brain.”

Australians Bianca Jones and Holly Bowles, both 19, also tragically died after consuming alcohol while staying at the hostel in Laos.

So were the victims, who were celebrating their graduation in Laos taken to hospital after being found unresponsive after failing to check out of the Nana Backpacker hotel.

Ms Jones and Ms Bowles did not leave their hostel dormitory 24 hours after going to Jaidee Bar and reported feeling unwell on November 13 before being rushed to hospitals in Bangkok.

CCTV footage from the hostel shows one of the women being transported to a local clinic on the back of a motorcycle driven by a hotel staff member.

James Louis Hutson, a 57-year-old American, and Danish nationals Anne-Sofie Orkild Coyman, 20, and Freja Vennervald Sorensen, 21, were also named as victims of a wave of tragic deaths believed to be linked to methanol poisoning.