Indonesian maid found dead at foot of Punggol flat
An Indonesian maid in her thirties was found dead at the foot of a flat in Punggol Edgedale Plains on Thursday morning.
The Singapore Civil Defence Force said it received a call to Block 174C Edgedale Plains at about 5:25am. Paramedics who arrived at the scene shortly afterwards pronounced her dead.
According to Chinese daily Lianhe Wanbao, she was believed to be cleaning the windows in the flat when she fell.
Residents said the deceased lived in a unit on the fifth floor with an elderly person. A 64-year-old housewife, who lives at the third floor of the block, said her son heard a loud thump at about 5:20 am. He did not think much about it and continued on his activities.
Another resident said that at about 6:30am police had arrived and cordoned off the area. The body was covered with a white plastic sheet and removed shortly.
According to the resident, who declined to be named, police went from door to door asking residents if there was any one missing from their flats. Shortly, she witnessed an elderly woman identify the body as her maid.
Women falling to their deaths when trying to clean windows or hang laundry from high-rise flats are usually reported every year.
Just last month, a 64-year-old housewife had fallen to her death from her HDB flat in Bishan while standing on a chair and cleaning a window in her flat.
Between 2006 and 2010, 27 foreign maids have died from fatal falls while washing windows or hanging out bamboo poles of clothes.
Last year, an Indonesian maid fell seven storeys from a flat in Queenstown while hanging the laundry out of the window.
In another related incident, a four-year-old boy died last week after a fatal fall from his five-storey flat in Jurong West.
Police are still investigating the incident.
