SINGAPORE: Three people were unconscious after a fire in an HDB flat in Little India on Monday (Aug 3).
They were among five people trapped in a fifth-floor unit at Block 684 Race Course Road when firefighters arrived.
One person was rescued by the police, and the other four were rescued by the Singapore Civil Defence Force (SCDF).
Three of the victims were taken to Singapore General Hospital and two to Tan Tock Seng Hospital, said SCDF in a Facebook post on Aug 3.
The Straits Times understands that four of the victims are in their 70s and 80s, while one is over 50.
SCDF said it was alerted to the fire at 7.10pm.
Upon its arrival, a bedroom in the flat was on fire. It was extinguished with a water jet, said SCDF.
An MP for Jalan Besar GRC, Denise Phua, arrived at the scene at about 8pm.
She said town council staff were cleaning and clearing the area.
Temporary accommodation has been arranged for a family member of the affected unit who had returned home later, and care packs have been sent to residents, she added.
Several of the victims are above 70, Phua said.
She thanked the agencies involved, rescuers, workers and volunteers for their efforts.
When ST arrived at around 9.45pm on Aug 3, at least three SCDF vehicles were present. Water could be seen spraying out of a fifth-storey unit, and a police cordon had been set up.
The metal grille on the window on the fifth-floor unit seems to have come off almost entirely.
A resident who wanted to be known only as Ng and who lives in the opposite block, said that when he reached home at around 7pm, nothing was amiss.
But five minutes later, a neighbour alerted him to thick black smoke in the air. He noticed that it was coming out of the affected unit’s window.
Ng, 65, who lives on the seventh floor of Block 685, said: “It all happened so fast, within a few minutes. It was so scary how black and fierce the smoke was from the window.”
He tried to see if anyone was running out of the unit, but he saw that the door was shut.
“I realised then that someone must have been trapped inside,” said Ng, a retiree.
He said his neighbour told him that one of the victims is blind and another is unable to walk properly.
Ng added that he saw a woman being carried out on a stretcher.
Nur Maisha Romana, 17, who lives on the sixth floor of the affected block, said her flat was filled with thick smoke and it became hard for her family to breathe.
“The police knocked on our door and told us to evacuate,” said the student.
She added that she saw a man and two women being carried out of the affected unit.
“One of the women was carried out by policemen,” said Maisha.
A neighbour who wanted to be known only as Tim said his first thought was to save his cat, which had just had surgery.
The 54-year-old, who also lives on the sixth floor, said the smoke had gone from bad to worse in a matter of minutes.
He immediately took his cat and ran downstairs, where there was already a group of residents.
Tim walked to his sister’s place 10 minutes away so his cat could be more comfortable.
“I didn’t think or care about taking any other belongings once I smelled smoke – just my cat,” he said.
Investigations are ongoing.
There have been at least two other fires in HDB flats in the past week, both of them fatal.
On July 31, a fire in a Clementi flat left one person dead, and two firefighters were taken to hospital for burn injuries.
The occupant of the eighth-floor unit was taken to hospital unconscious and later died there.
One of the firefighters is resting at home, said SCDF in an update on Aug 1.
The other is recovering in hospital after a procedure, said Sim Ann, an MP for Holland-Bukit Timah GRC, in a Facebook post on Aug 3.
The firefighting operation had been hampered by a dry rising main that was not in proper working condition.
On July 28, a 70-year-old man died after a fire broke out in an HDB flat in MacPherson.
He was taken unconscious to Changi General Hospital, where he later died, said SCDF and the police.
The SCDF said in its annual statistics report on Feb 11 that the total number of fires increased by 3 per cent – from 1,990 in 2024 to 2,050 in 2025. Of these, 1,051 involved fires at residential buildings.
Unattended cooking and electrical fires – including faults in electrical wiring or overloaded sockets – remained the top two causes of home fires.
Of the 304 cases of electrical fires at residential premises in 2025, 34 involved active mobility devices. These include personal mobility devices, power-assisted bicycles and personal mobility aids.
More people got hurt in fires – from 80 in 2024 to 94 in 2025.
There were six fire fatalities and 94 fire injuries in 2025, according to the report. There were seven fire deaths and 80 fire injuries in 2024. - The Straits Times/ANN
