Girl, 18, rescued from Admiralty flat blaze

SINGAPORE - Trapped in her burning flat on the 16th storey, the teen rushed to a bedroom window and shouted for help.

Fortunately, civil servant Hong Jiawei, 27, who lives directly below, heard her last night.

When he peered out of the kitchen window of his flat in Block 360A Admiralty Drive around 8.30pm, he was shocked to see smoke coming out of the unit above.

Mr Hong and his father immediately sprinted upstairs to see what they could do.

He said: "While my father was busy alerting the other three households upstairs about the fire, I decided to run back to my own flat to call 995."

By then, his neighbour told him that she had difficulty breathing. He saw more smoke coming from her flat.

"She also told me that she was alone in her flat. I didn't get to see her face.

"I had never met her before," said Mr Hong.

He said that officers from the Singapore Civil Defence Force (SCDF) arrived five to 10 minutes later and rescued his neighbour.

Mr Hong went to the ground floor to try and check on her but was blocked by the large crowd that had gathered there.

About 10 SCDF officers were seen near a fire engine, busy carrying out their duties.

On the 16th storey, the door to the affected unit was wide open.

BURNT OUT

Burnt bits of debris were seen in and around the unit. There was an acrid smell and the floor was wet from the rescuers' fire-fighting efforts.

Responding to queries from The New Paper, the SCDF said that it received a call at 8.45pm yesterday about the incident.

Its spokesman said officers forced their way into the flat and rescued an 18-year-old girl.

She was taken to the Singapore General Hospital for smoke inhalation.

Residents from the neighbouring units were also evacuated as a precaution.

The SCDF said that the cause of the fire is still under investigation.

This article was first published on August 13, 2014.
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