Lift in Tampines block suspended after malfunction

The lift at Block 890C Tampines Avenue 1 remains suspended and investigations by an independent examiner are ongoing. PHOTO: LIANHE ZAOBAO

SINGAPORE - Tampines Town Council has suspended operations of a lift after it malfunctioned earlier this week.

The incident took place on Monday (Feb 13) at Block 890C Tampines Avenue 1 when a 20-year-old man wanted to take the lift down from the sixth floor after visiting his friend's home, reported Shin Min News Daily on Saturday.

However, the lift went all the way up to the 14th floor instead, stopping for a while, before it abruptly descended to the fifth floor.

The man, who was only named Mr Lok, told the Chinese paper that no matter how many times he pressed the lift button, the lift would only go up to the 14th floor before stopping.

"But the lift door still remained shut. I pressed the button many times but it still couldn't open and I was very scared," he told Shin Min.

Chairman of Tampines Town Council Mr Baey Yam Keng had gone down to the site on Monday night following the incident and said that this was the first time that such an accident had occurred.

The lift remains suspended and investigations by an independent examiner are ongoing, he added.

"We are relieved the man was not injured and hope that residents would bear with the inconvenience of having one of the lifts down. We need to know exactly what happened in order to take necessary action," Mr Baey told The Straits Times.

This incident follows a spate of lift breakdowns last year.

In March last year, a lift at Block 317, Ang Mo Kio Street 31, suddenly shot up 17 storeys to the top floor, causing an Indonesian domestic worker to fall and hurt her back. The lift later stalled, trapping her inside for 1½ hours before she was rescued.

Then later in April, a woman was injured when the lift she was in suddenly shot up and down, at Block 150, Petir Road.

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