Nadya’s
back for new
Asia’s Next
Top Model
But why
aren’t
the rest?
Bid for
Shahril’s
boots
at our
LionsXII
dinner
Page 49
Page 22
TNP FILE PICTURE
MAID PLUNGES
14 STOREYS FROM
TANAH MERAH
CONDO BLOCK
MAN
BREAKS
LEG
TRYING TO
CATCH HER
TNP PICTURE: BENJAMIN SEETOR
Expert says he’s lucky to be alive as
impact is like being hit by speeding car Page 2
FRIDAY
JULY 19
2013
2 Friday, July 19 2013

THE NEW PAPER Friday, July 19 2013 3
THE NEW PAPER

News
Like being hit by
a speeding car
BEING hit by a body weighing 50kg falling
from height is akin to being rammed by a
car moving at 100kmh.
Dr John Heng, a senior research fellow
at Nanyang Technological University’s
(NTU) School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, said this is why Mr
Rozaimi Zainal should not have tried to
catch the maid who fell from the 14th
storey.
“It would almost feel like being hit by a
Toyota Corolla travelling at 100kmh. Our
arms are not built to catch a car,” Dr Heng
said.
“If it were from a lower height, say
lower than five storeys, a remotely possible way is to deflect the body’s direction
of fall.”
Dr Heng said it might be possible to
catch a baby falling from no higher than
the fifth storey.
“I would advise that the maximum
height to catch a falling body is not more
than five storeys for babies lighter than
3kg, or three storeys for babies weighing
up to 5kg.”
Associate Professor Lu Guoxing from
the same school in NTU said the falling
woman would be equivalent to at least
2,000kg of force on impact.
“It is not a good idea to catch a falling
adult,” he said.
Assoc Prof Joseph Thambiah, the head
PICTURES: BENJAMIN SEETOR, GOOGLE MAP
GREAT IMPACT: Mr Rozaimi Zainal (right) tried to catch the falling maid at Tanamera
Crest condominium (above), but the impact sent him sprawling to the ground and shattered
the bones in his left leg.
Cleaning supervisor sees woman
rolling off 14th-storey ledge
He catches her, shattering the
bones in his leg
Woman dies in his arms
‘I SEE HER BODY
every time I close my eyes’
REPORT: DAVID SUN
[email protected]
H
E IS a cleaning supervisor from Malaysia. She was an Indonesian maid.
As foreigners working at Tanamera Crest
condominium, they had smiled at each other and
spoken briefly.
Then, on July 10, she fell into his arms in the
worst way imaginable – she had plunged from the
14th storey and he had tried to catch her.
Though Mr Rozaimi Zainal, 36, managed to get
his outstretched arms to her plummeting body, the
impact sent him sprawling to the ground, shattering the bones in his left leg.
He was then pinned down by her lifeless body,
unable to move until he was rescued.
When The New Paper visited Mr Rozaimi at
Changi General Hospital (CGH) on Wednesday
evening, he recalled the horrific incident.
He was at ground level when he saw the maid,
who was working for a resident in the condominium at 6, Pari Dedap Walk, standing on a ledge at the
TNP hotline: 1800-7 33
44 55
highest floor of a block.
“She was standing there and she looked scared,”
he said.
“I shouted up at her, ‘Don’t jump! Don’t jump!’
Then she lay down on the ledge and rolled off.”
He stretched out his arms and her body landed
on them. He said: “Her head was on my left arm and
her legs on my right. But I couldn’t save her.”
A spokesman for the Singapore Civil Defence
Force (SCDF) said it received a call at 4.10pm on
July 10 about the incident and sent an ambulance,
which took the injured Mr Rozaimi to CGH.
Painful
A police spokesman said the woman was in her
30s and investigations are ongoing.
Mr Rozaimi, who underwent his third operation
on Wednesday, said: “It’s painful and the doctor says I have to be here for at least another seven
weeks. The bones in my leg are all shattered.”
His left leg was bandaged and metal rods were
sticking out from it.
SMS/MMS: 94778899
Website: tnp.sg Email: [email protected]
“As a human being,
as a fellow person, it
is my duty to at least
try to save another
person’s life.”
– Mr Rozaimi Zainal
He said his medical bills would be covered by insurance and he trusted his company to settle the
paperwork for him.
“I’m quite traumatised. I find it hard to sleep at
night,” he said.
“I managed to catch her, but she died anyway. I
see her body every time I close my eyes.”
Fax: 6319 8266
To subscribe: 6388
3838
OTHER CASES
SINGAPORE
2011
A 48-year-old administrative assistant who
was slipping into depression leapt from a
block in Bishan and landed on a 54-yearold retiree who was on her way home after
buying lunch. The two women, who died
on the spot, lived four storeys apart in the
same block.
2006
A man in his 30s tried to commit suicide
by jumping off the third storey of a block in
Hougang. He landed on a six-year-old girl
and survived. The girl broke her thigh bone.
He was sentenced to nine months’ supervised probation.
ELSEWHERE
China, last month
A little girl, left alone at home by her parents in Ninghai, Zhejiang province, crawled
out through a window, reported BBC News.
The divorced man with a 14-year-old daughter
said he did not have much of an impression of the
maid, but she had not seemed depressed the few
times they had spoken briefly.
“She was always looking after her employer’s
children and did not seem upset about anything
when we greeted each other,” he said.
Professor Joseph Thambiah, the head and senior
consultant at National University Hospital’s division of musculoskeletal trauma, said it is impossible
to save someone falling from that height and that
Mr Rozaimi could have died too. (See report at top.)
When asked why he had risked his life to save the
maid, Mr Rozaimi said: “I don’t know where I got
the courage or why I tried.
“But if it were to happen again with the same
consequence, I would try again.
“As a human being, as a fellow person, it is my
duty to at least try to save another person’s life.”
When TNP visited the maid’s employer at his
penthouse unit on Wednesday, he would say only
and senior consultant of the Division of
Musculoskeletal Trauma at the National
University Hospital, said Mr Rozaimi is
lucky to be alive.
“There was a high chance that he could
have died with her,” he said.
“If he had taken the full force of the impact, it would definitely have killed him.”
He added that it was impossible in such
a situation to escape without injury.
“There is no way to prevent injury to
either him or her,” he said.
“Catching someone from a height will
most certainly hurt you.”
Certain death
As for the maid, she was almost certain
to be killed the moment she started falling, he said.
“From that height, she would have died
of poly-trauma on impact. Poly-trauma is
having various injuries all over the body
from the impact.”
Asked what other outcomes there
could have been, Prof Thambiah said: “It
is difficult to predict the outcomes when
trying to catch a body falling from height
because of so many factors, such as angle
and body positioning.”
Explaining why Mr Rozaimi broke his
leg while his hands were unharmed, he
said: “She most likely fell onto his hands
which gave way and then onto his thigh.”
Delivery men caught her with outstretched arms as she fell from the fifth
storey of the building.
At least two of the men were injured.
The girl escaped with a minor facial wound.
India, 2010
A mentally challenged youth, 25, jumped off
a water tank in a bid to kill himself, only to
land on a 55-year-old man standing below
to watch the drama unfold, reported The
Times of India.
The youth was reported to have escaped
that he had told the police everything.
His neighbours declined to comment.
A gardener at the condominium said residents
and workers there had been talking about the incident.
“It happened at about 4pm at Block 6. The cleaning supervisor tried to catch the maid, but he broke
his leg. We have not seen him at work since,” he said,
adding that the other maids in the condominium
did not know the dead maid well.
Help people
Mr Rozaimi’s supervisor, Mr Randy Low, from
Starlike Maintenance Services, said his employees
would often go the extra mile to help people.
He commended Mr Rozaimi, saying what he did
took a lot of courage.
“He did something most people would not do. He
broke his leg while trying to save her and I think
that shows that he is a good man.”
with minor injuries while the onlooker
ended up with a fractured leg.
US, 2009
A woman in her 50s jumped to her death
from the third floor of the Queens Center
Mall in New York.
She landed on a high school student,
17, who was relaxing on a massage chair
below, reported The New York Times.
The student survived but had a gash on his
head so large that it required 23 staples.
HELPLINES
Samaritans of Singapore
(SOS)
Hotline: 1800-221-4444 (24 hours)
Website: www.samaritans.org.sg
Care Corner Counselling
Centre (Mandarin)
Hotline: 1800-353-5800
(10am to 10pm daily, except public holidays)
Website: www.carecorner.org.sg
Institute of Mental Health
Crisis Helpline
Hotline: 6389 2222 (24 hours)
Website: www.imh.com.sg