Industrial fire breaks out at Gul Lane, one man taken to hospital

SINGAPORE: An industrial fire broke out at Gul Lane on Friday (Jan 21) which took the Singapore Civil Defence Force (SCDF) 20 emergency vehicles and about 70 firefighters to extinguish.

The blaze, which was about the size of a football field, involved an industrial premises which largely contained drums with flammable liquid and industrial chemicals.

SCDF said it was alerted to the fire at about 2.50pm and about 40 workers had self-evacuated before their arrival. 

Officers were met with a fire that was "raging intensely and threatening to spread along the drain surrounding the premises" at the scene. Resources were immediately deployed to surround and contain the fire, said SCDF.

"Donning breathing apparatus, firefighters faced intense heat and thick black acrid smoke while preventing the fire from spreading to the other storage drums and the neighbouring premises," it added.

"At the height of the firefighting operation, seven water jets, including an Unmanned Firefighting Machine (UFM) were used to mitigate the fire."

Foam was also used to cover or blanket the surfaces of flammable liquids, which according to the SCDF is a more effective strategy for such fires.

The fire was extinguished at about 3.30pm.

A man was taken to Ng Teng Fong General Hospital for burn injuries on his forearm, said SCDF. No other injuries were reported.

Damping down operations were ongoing, said SCDF in a Facebook post on Friday evening. Damping down refers to the application of water to wet burnt surfaces immediately after a fire is put out, to prevent a potential rekindle of fire from hot burnt surfaces.

The cause of the fire is under investigation.