A worker who injured his leg while working 70m above the ground in a tower crane was rescued by Singapore Civil Defence Force (SCDF) officers on Friday evening (Nov 12).
Specialists from SCDF’s elite Disaster Assistance and Rescue Team (Dart) and firefighters from the Central Fire Station were alerted at about 8.45 pm and deployed to a construction site in Beach Road.
As the injured worker could not climb down from the tower crane to safety, two firefighters, including one who was trained as an emergency medical technician, climbed up a cat ladder to reach him.
They found the worker lying on a platform, SCDF said in a Facebook post on Saturday.
Suspecting that the worker had broken his leg, the firefighters bandaged and immobilised the leg as they waited for the Dart officers to start the rescue operation.
Two Dart officers climbed up the crane to set up a lowering system comprising ropes and pulleys, while a separate Dart team prepared to receive the worker on the ground.
One of the two Dart officers had also attached himself to a stretcher that was used to lower the injured worker, who was later assessed by an SCDF ambulance crew and taken to Singapore General Hospital.
SCDF said the stretcher was lowered using a powered ascender – a specialised, portable and battery-operated device – to accelerate the rescue operation.
