Early morning thunderstorm damages vehicles
A tree buffeted by winds from an early morning thunderstorm on Tuesday fell and damaged several vehicles in a Bukit Batok estate carpark.
Motorcycle owner Muhammad Faizal told Yahoo! Singapore that he saw around five motorcycles, three cars and one van affected by the uprooted tree near Block 201.
He saw his own 7-year-old bike, which he just recently serviced and repaired, on the ground when he wanted to go to work in the morning at 9am.
The Bukit Batok resident recounted that there were already two trucks at the scene when he came down, with town council workers clearing up the branches and the tree.
The 27-year-old said, "I've been parking in the same area for the past six years, and nothing has happened to my motorcycle so far."
He estimates the damages to his bike to be around S$4,000 because the parts are from Italy.
Residents who spoke to Faizal while he was cleaning up his motorcycle told him that the tree had been leaning "for quite some time".
They added that some of them had already brought up the matter of the leaning tree to the town council previously.
Jurong town council's supervisor, K. Ratnakumar, told Yahoo! Singapore that he received a call around 4am from the maintenance unit about a fallen tree.
He said that the winds were very strong, which was why the tree got uprooted.
He also added that on top of clearing up the uprooted tree, the town council has trimmed the branches of two trees near the accident site for safety precaution.
"With the weather now more rainy and windy, we trimmed the branches off the other trees to reduce the chances of strong winds uprooting them again," he said.
