Within a short span of 1 week, there were 2 large fires that occurred at industrial sites. The first one took place on 21 Jan 2022 at Gul Lane, where the fire was about the size of a football field and utilized 20 emergency vehicles from the Singapore Civil Defence Force (SCDF) and 70 firefighters before the fire was extinguished. The premise had stored drums containing flammable liquids and chemicals. The second fire took place on 25 Jan 2022, in the Pioneer area, with 40 firefighters involved to extinguish the fire which involved a “large pile” of construction waste measuring about 20m by 20m and 6m in height.
Thankfully, there were no reported fatalities or serious injuries in both instances, except for a man who sustained burns on his forearms in the first fire.
It calls to mind the fact that things are and can be very unpredictable, and sometimes it just takes a spark to set off a huge chain of reaction. The fires, coupled with subsequent investigations by SCDF into the cause, will no doubt put the operations of both industrial sites on hold for quite a while. On top of that, the companies would have faced huge inventory losses as well. Having a fire or all risk insurance in place will have mitigated the loss. The companies could have faced potential liabilities from companies in neighbouring sites as well if the fire had spread to their units, which is also known as public liability.
The importance of having the right insurance cannot be exemplified more by the Mapletree incident that took place in Hong Kong. Contact MAKinsure to ensure your company is adequately insured on all levels, making sure of a lifeline in the event the unforeseen happens.