Originally posted by SMRT Buses:
Monday February 5, 2:17 PM
[b]Fire engulfs flat, causes 50 residents in the block to evacuate
SINGAPORE: Three separate cases of fire broke out within hours of one another on Sunday afternoon.
Two were caused by unattended cooking in the kitchens and happened just a few blocks from each other in Jurong West St 52.
No casualties were reported in those two fires.
But a third fire engulfed an entire flat in Bedok Reservoir Road and resulted in the evacuation of nearly all residents in the entire block.
Mobile phone footage taken by an eyewitness showed that smoke from the fire rose as high as 11 storeys.
Some witnesses told Channel NewsAsia that they even heard a loud explosion in the flat's kitchen at the peak of the fire.
"The fire started suddenly. I was alone, along my flat's corridor, burning incense. Someone then said 'Fire!' I ran into my flat, saw lots of smoke and ran out," said 74-year-old Lam Chin Ying, the owner of the four-room flat.
Firefighters took about 10 minutes to put out the flames and evacuated about 50 residents from the third to eighth floors.
Nazlene Abd Ghani said: "We were told to evacuate due to the massive smoke. I called along my neighbour, an old lady. Someone then offered to help her down the stairs. But the ground was wet. And they slipped. The old lady injured her back."
SCDF officers said three persons were sent to hospital, two for inhaling excessive smoke from the fire.
They said the blaze started in the kitchen and then spread to the living room and bedrooms.
Evacuated residents returned to their homes about an hour later. - CNA/ir [/b]
i stay near by Bedok Res. but missed all the episode.