Concrete slab falls from HDB flat ceiling, strikes boy's back

Like a bolt from the blue, a six-year-old was struck on the back by a falling piece of concrete in the toilet at home.

"The worst nightmare for me and esp my son [sic]," the boy's mother Syasha wrote in a Facebook post on Tuesday (May 19). "Happily playing with water end up, this. Concrete ceiling drop on his back. [sic]"

The attached photos showed a trickle of blood oozing down the child's dust-covered back, while several large shards of concrete lay next to the toilet bowl. A steel bar in her ceiling was also visible amid a large area of exposed concrete.

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In an interview with Lianhe Wanbao, Syasha recounted how she and her sister were sitting outside when they heard screams coming from their sons in the toilet. 

"We thought the two boys were fighting, who knew such an accident would've happened." 

Despite the scare, her son escaped from the incident mostly unharmed, save for a couple of abrasions. He was released from hospital after getting a x-ray scan and doctors found that no stitches were needed.

Hours after going home, the boy already asked whether his dressings could be removed, Syasha shared.

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Her sister contacted the Housing Development Board (HDB) and her town council after the incident. HDB told AsiaOne their officers visited the flat the same day and found spalling concrete in the ceiling of the toilet. 

Falling chunks of concrete occur as a result of spalling concrete — when carbonation causes the steel bars embedded in the ceiling to corrode, resulting in a cracked and bulging concrete covers. This issue is more common for older buildings, and more so in moisture-prone areas such as kitchens and bathrooms, as humidity speeds up the carbonation process, HDB explained.

The incident took place in a Henderson Road block which is 45 years old. Syasha told the Chinese evening daily that her family had taken notice of cracks in the ceiling earlier. 

It was only after the contractors came to clear the debris and remove loose concrete from other parts of the flat that she realised the ceiling needed repairs long ago. 

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According to HDB's home care guide, homeowners are responsible for the repair of any spalling concrete within their flat. 

However, as the unit involved is a rental flat, the housing board said it will bear the cost of repair works which are scheduled for Friday (May 22).

Just last November, a tenant in Cassia Crescent was nearly struck by a slab of concrete weighing 3.4kg after the ceiling above his bed had cracked.

In another separate incident in 2017, parts of a kitchen ceiling fell in the middle of the night, narrowly missing an elderly woman who was making her way to the toilet.

rainercheung@asiaone.com