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SINGAPORE’s storied shopping malls have the unrivalled knack of knocking consumers out cold with their architectural grandeur, premium wares and mouth-watering deals.
But the Alexandra Central Mall gave a hapless visitor more than she could bargain for on Sunday with a move that left her literally almost at death’s door.
In a harrowing case of being at the wrong place at the wrong time, a heavy swing glass door dislodged of its own accord and collapsed heavily onto the woman as she faced the opposite direction, waiting for a lift.
The blow was devastating, and left the woman with fractures to her head, pelvis and legs, and damage to her liver. According to the Straits Times’ portal Stomp, which first broke the news, she is currently in a high-dependency ward at Singapore’s National University Hospital.
Footage of the 6.30pm accident, captured by a closed circuit television (CCTV) camera, was leaked from the mall (to the management’s great displeasure) and published online. The 52-second video went viral almost instantly – and stunned Singaporeans who are used to everything functioning like clockwork, and are strangers to the concept of “freak accidents.”
The footage opens with a family of four exiting a lift on the mall’s fourth floor carpark lobby and entering the carpark through two swing glass doors.
As they leave, a man enters through the wide open doors and swiftly presses a lift button. The tall glass doors behind him swing slowly closed.
Suddenly, the left door is pulled open and in enters the woman. She comes to a stop behind the man, who is her husband. The couple is part of a family of eight who had arrived at the mall in three cars and are looking forward to an early dinner.
As the woman rifles through her bag, intently searching for something, the left door swings slowly shut – and nudges the right door, which, incredibly, is completely dislodged from its top hinge. It leans slowly inward, but falls swiftly – with only the woman to break its fall.
The door first smashes the woman square on the head, before falling with her to the floor and landing largely on her torso. As she lies unmoving, her stupefied husband attempts to remove the glass and metal panel, but as he would later tell Stomp, the door was simply too heavy.
Another man – the woman’s brother, who had just arrived – sprints into view and frantically helps the woman’s husband lift the door off the victim. Another woman arrives, and the group lifts the wounded lady into a sitting position, examining and speaking to her in a panic. It is not clear if the woman is still conscious.
The footage ends with a fifth member of the family rushing into view while frenziedly fidgeting with his mobile phone to call for help.