Boatmen help put out fire on yacht

Moments after thick black smoke emerged from a burning yacht that was docked at Marina at Keppel Bay yesterday morning, some mechanics resting nearby saw boatmen from other vessels running towards the location to try to put out the flames.

Eyewitnesses said around 20 men sprinted to the location with hose pipes and attached them to hydrants along the pontoon to spray water at the burning vessel, while some shouted "fire" to alert other boatmen in the vicinity.

The boats parked next to the burning yacht - some estimated to be worth millions of dollars - were quickly moved to safety by the boatmen, said one of the mechanics, Mr Sabiq Zainal, 34.

Mr Sabiq, who witnessed the scene behind the security access gate at the pier, said: "The fire was quite big. If these men didn't run down, the fire could have spread to the other ships and maybe the whole lane would have gone up in flames."

He added: "It was a fast response and what the men did was heroic."

The boat is owned by financial service provider Advisors Alliance Group and a local team used it to sail across the Indian Ocean from Seychelles to Singapore earlier this year.

Two boatmen who declined to be named said the yacht is called Advisors Alliance II.

Firefighters from Marina Bay and Alexandra fire stations were at the scene at 11.30am and, with the help of staff on the premises, extinguished the fire in an hour.

No injuries were reported, said the Singapore Civil Defence Force.

The cause of the fire is under investigation.

Videos of the incident were circulated on social media and some showed plumes of black smoke rising from the yacht, which was berthed among other vessels at the marina.

Other videos showed a group of people spraying water from a hose metres away from the burning vessel.

At around 5pm yesterday, the badly damaged two-hulled yacht - much of it submerged in the water - remained docked along one of the lanes.

In 2018, members of the public reacted first to put out a fire that broke out on a yacht docked at Sentosa Cove.

A child and 14 other people were hospitalised for burn injuries and smoke inhalation.

• Additional reporting by Young Zhan Heng and Karen See