It looks like a war zone to residents returning home after the Bukit Merah blast, but help is at hand for them
GUTTED: The blast blew out the front wall of a one-room rental unit (above) on the sixth floor, ripped off kitchen windows and frames, and sent them flying 15m from the block, even as firefighters rushed to the scene. -- ST PHOTO: FRANCIS ONG
THEY are grateful to be alive.
But the residents who made it out of their homes in yesterday's blast and fire in a flat in Block 105, Jalan Bukit Merah have realised that their ordeal is not quite over.
Allowed back into their sixth-floor flats after the fire was put out, they saw the extent of the damage and the little that could be salvaged from their one-room rental homes.
It looked like a war zone.
They picked their way over twisted metal and puddles of water left by the firefighters, down a corridor darkened with soot.
And as they made their way past a gaping hole where the front wall of a flat once stood, they were reminded of the 6.15am blast which left its 70-year-old tenant with severe burns, an elderly woman with serious smoke inhalation injuries and three others with breathing difficulties.
Soot plastered the walls in some flats; melted wires dangled from some ceilings.
There was no way they were going to be able to move back into their homes last night - or perhaps even the next few nights.
The affected residents came from eight units along the sixth floor and one unit on the seventh directly above the blast flat.
As Mr Cheong Soon Onn, 65, who lived alone in the unit next to the blast flat, sifted through the items in his soot-covered home, he said in Mandarin: 'I'm glad they banged on my door to ask me to run, or I would have been burnt to death here.'
His sister's family was with him to help him gather his things.
One resident gathered essential items like passports and wallets into a bag; another moved some plastic boxes and suitcases of clothes.
An emergency meeting was called about four hours after the blast and fire to bring together the agencies that will help the victims.
Associate Professor Koo Tsai Kee, a Member of Parliament for the area, which is in the Tanjong Pagar GRC, told reporters that although the building was structurally sound, measures were being taken to ensure the area was safe before residents would be allowed to move back.
The flats that need cleaning and painting will get the necessary help soon, even as the victims were given $100 and another $100 in supermarket vouchers by the area's community development council.
At the Sarah Senior Activity Centre on the second floor of the block, social services staff coordinated aid for the victims or counselled them.
While the resident in one unit went to live with relatives, the Housing Board extended help to five families, putting them up in vacant units in the same block or those nearby.
As those affected received their keys at around 3pm, one resident, Mr Muhammad Nizam Muhammad Kassim, 26, turned down a unit on the sixth floor, although it was sited away from the damage.
'Phobia, lah,' is all he would say.
Neighbours not normally chatty with each other started swopping accounts and taking turns to view a video of the day's drama on somebody's mobile phone. (Visit www.straitstimes.com to see the clip, which is part of the online team's report.)
Madam Salbiyah Sinin, 33, quipped: 'Now we are talking like we have known each other for years!'
Another resident said to her as they parted ways to move into their temporary homes: 'We will be staying in the same block, if you need help you can just call me.'
VIDEO Link - http://tinyurl.com/27zs87 [The Straits Times Video News]
Elderly badly burnt and residents evacuated in Bukit Merah blaze (2:49)
An early morning blaze in Bukit Merah flat left the unit completely destroyed with its elderly occupant suffering first degree burns.
Some residents were also evacuated and placed in temporary homes as the fire gutted neighbouring units.
The incident at Blk 105 Jalan Bukit Merah happened at 6:15 am Friday Morning.
Choo Ren Min was at the scene and filed this report.
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