အိမ္နီးခ်င္းကို မီးအတြင္းမွ ရြတ္ရြတ္ခ်ြံ ခ်ြံ ကယ္ေသာ ျမန္မာ အမ်ိဳးသမီး မစႏၵာေက်ာ္

Housewife yanks out window panes when she can't break padlock of neighbour's burning flat to save family.
I told myself not to panic
By Hedy Khoo
November 11, 2008
HER neighbour's flat was on fire - and she didn't think twice about the danger she herself faced.

Despite the thick smoke and strong flames, the Myanmar housewife's only thought was to save her trapped neighbours.

When her attempt at opening the locked door failed, she didn't give up. She managed to free them by yanking out two metal window louvres with her bare hands.

Thanks to Madam Sandar Kyaw's selfless bravery, a woman and two children escaped unscathed from the Jurong one-room flat which was damaged in the fire on 31 Oct.

In recognition of her good deed, the Singapore Civil Defence Force (SCDF) will present her with a Public Spiritedness Award on Wednesday.

Madam Sandar, 40, was meditating in the living room of her 10th-storey flat at Block 134A, Kang Ching Road, around 2.40pm when she smelled smoke.

When she stepped out into the common corridor to take a look, she was shocked to see that her neighbour's flat, three units away, was on fire.


Said Madam Sandar: 'I started shaking, but when I heard a woman shouting, my immediate thought was to see if there was anyone inside the burning flat.'

She raced towards the smoke and flames. To her shock, she saw an Indian woman and two young children in the bedroom of the flat through the window next to the main door.

'They were trapped because the living room was on fire,' she said.

'The woman was standing at the window and shouting for help. I couldn't understand her language, but she was crying. The two children were so frozen by fear, they did not even dare move,' Madam Sandar recalled.

Her heart sank when she saw that the main grille gate was padlocked.
'I told myself to stay calm and ran back to my flat and dialled 999 to call for help,' she said.

She then grabbed a pair of pliers and ran back to the burning flat to try to break the lock.
But she failed as the pliers were useless, she said.

DEVASTATED: The fire was already put out when firemen arrived. An SCDF spokesperson said in a wooden shelf in the living room had caught fire. The cause has not been established.
'The smoke was choking and my eyes started to go blurry. The heat was quite unbearable. I couldn't touch the grille gate as the metal was heated up from the fire,' she said.

By then, other neighbours had started to use pails of water to try to subdue the flames as she continued trying to prise the lock open.

'My heart was pounding. I was very worried about the people in the flat. I had to keep telling myself not to panic and think of how to get them out,' she said.

Then an idea came to her. If she could remove the metal louvres from the bedroom window, the mother and children could climb out, she thought.

She touched the metal panes and they were not hot yet, so she started to pull at them with her bare hands.

The petite woman, who stands at 1.5m and weighs 50kg, threw her entire strength into the task at hand.

'I don't know how I managed to remove the metal panes. They were tightly in place. I think the thought of lives at stake gave me the strength at that moment,' she said.

She said a young Indian woman, whom she didn't know, also helped to pull at the metal panes.

They managed to pull out two metal panes.

'I reached in and grabbed the children one by one and carried them to my flat. Then I helped the mother climb out,' said Madam Sandar.

Several neighbours helped to put out the fire soon after that.

Madam Sandar made the children sit in her living room, and put on a cartoon show on television for them.

Kids never cried

'I gave them water and biscuits and they seemed to calm down. They didn't even cry. I was so happy to see them safe,' she recalled with a smile.

An SCDF spokesman said they had responded to a call at 2.48pm and despatched a fire engine, a red Rhino, two firebikes and one support vehicle to the scene.

But the fire was already out when they arrived. No other flat was affected.

The spokesman said a wooden shelf in the living room had caught fire. The cause has not been established.

Madam Sandar, who is on a social visit pass to visit her husband, a Myanmar engineer who is a permanent resident working here, said she was relieved that everyone was safe.

She did not know where her neighbours had moved to, as she didn't know them very well. She said they usually exchange greetings with smiles and nods when they see one another.

When The New Paper found out the family had moved to another rental flat a few stories down, Madam Sandar decided to visit them last week.

The rescued woman, Indian national Dhanalakshmi Kumar, 30, a housewife who is a permanent resident here, could not speak English, but she shook Madam Sandar's hand and thanked her profusely.

Her children, a 2-year-old boy and a 5-year-old girl, did not seem traumatised by their brush with danger, though they had light scratches on their arms and faces.

Her husband, Mr Senthil Kumar, 35, a piping designer, spoke to The New Paper over the phone and expressed his deepest thanks to Madam Sandar and his other neighbours for helping his family.

He had not been aware that it was Madam Sandar who had pulled his children and wife to safety. He said he was at work when the incident occurred.

'I am very touched,' he said. 'I never expected a neighbour whom we hardly knew to risk her life to save my family. It was a very brave thing to do.

'I would have lost my family if not for her courage.'




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