Gunung Ledang - Other deaths and near-misses

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Singapore


IN the early hours of 15 May, first-year National Institute of Education (NIE) trainee Mohammad Rohaizam Tumadi was killed by a falling tree on Mount Ophir.

He had been sleeping in his tent when the incident happened.

The National University of Singapore history graduate was completing a seven-day camping course conducted by the NIE.

In May 2002, Madam Ivy Ng, a 32-year-old photo shop manager dislocated her left shoulder and sprained her left foot when she lost her grip on the rope three quarters up the mountain and fell, rolling about 10m (four storeys) down a slope before a tree broke her fall.

In November 1998, six climbers, including four Singaporeans, were lost for several days in the jungles of Mount Ophir before they were rescued by a team of 10 General Operations Force personnel and a ranger.

In August 1997, five Singaporeans were lost for two days while trying to scale the mountain.

They eventually followed a stream to reach a rubber plantation.

In September 1995, a NUS undergrad, Miss Leong Sheau Ling, 19, died after falling off the Air Pernas waterfall at the mountain.

She was with 13 other campus friends when the accident happened.

In May 1994, Mr Pang Shui Fu, 29, an assistant engineer, is believed to have slipped and fallen into a lake at Mount Ophir.

His friends managed to pull him out but he died on the way to hospital.

In November 1992, 21 Singaporean students and teachers and 28 Malaysians were trapped at the foothills of the mountain for half a day after heavy torrential rains.

During the rescue, a Malaysian fire officer died when he fell into the Asahan River and was swept away.

One of the Singaporeans also almost drowned in the flooded river while trying to get help.

In April 1991, Mr Wesley Sim Chin Shing, 24, a die designer, plunged about 200m to his death at Bukit Emas on Mount Ophir.

Mr Sim, an experienced climber, died of head injuries.

In June 1990, Mr Koh Moh Shean, 19, a Ngee Ann Polytechnic student, was swept away by strong currents at a waterfall on Ophir.

He had gone hiking with 11 schoolmates, and was sitting on a rck when a powerful surge of water, believed to have been caused by a sudden downpour, flung him into the river.
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Labels: Nature