KUALA LUMPUR: A 65 year-old woman who was trying to retrieve her dentures from a squat toilet hole ended up getting her left arm stuck and had to be rescued by firemen.
The incident occurred at Anjung Singgah homeless centre at Jalan Hang Lekiu here, when the victim accidentally dropped her dentures down a squat toilet at 7.30am. In her effort to retrieve her dentures, she slipped and her entire arm became trapped in the hole.
A team of firemen who arrived on the scene had to resort to drilling open the centre’s waste pipe from the floor below using heavy machinery to free the victim’s arm.
City Fire and Rescue Department (KLFRD) operations centre chief Samsol Maarif Saibani said the firemen, from Hang Tuah fire station, had to race against time to rescue the woman, as she is a diabetic.
He said the response team of seven personnel were informed that her arm could develop gangrene if blood flow was not restored in time.
"After receiving the information, the team made an assessment and decided they had no choice but to break open a waste pipe in order to free the arm quickly.
"The team members then used two hacket machines – one was brought by volunteers from the Bukit Bintang Volunteer Fire Squad, while another, a heavy duty one, was borrowed from construction company Ikhmas Jaya Sdn Bhd – to drill the cement around the pipe.
"They managed to free the victim's arm at 11.32am," he said.
Samsol said the victim, who hails from Shah Alam, was then rushed to Kuala Lumpur Hospital for treatment.
The woman told her rescuers that she slipped and fell while trying to reach for the dentures.