A Sudden Hotel Collapse
In 1969, the Lian Yak Realty Company began construction of a six floor edifice at the corner of Serangoon Road and Owen Road in Singapore. It was completed in 1971, and housed the New Serangoon Hotel. The new establishment had an inauspicious start. In 1975, the hotel made headlines when 35 guests were knocked out and had to be hospitalized because of a toxic carbon monoxide leak. Despite the bad press, the hotel recovered, changed names, and resumed operations. By the 1980s, the building housed a branch of the Industrial & Commercial Branch on the first floor, and a night club on the second floor. The other four floors were occupied by the 67-room New World Hotel.
All began routine on March 15th, 1986, until 11:25 AM. Then, out of the blue, in less than a minute, the entire edifice collapsed. Not a single wall or column were left standing, and the entire structure was reduced to rubble. The cause was an incompetent architect and incompetent engineers who had screwed up basic design and construction calculations. The Hotel New World failure was one of the worst disasters in post-WWII Singapore. Initial rescue efforts were hampered by the fact that Singapore’s government lacked personnel trained or equipped to deal with such a situation. Fortunately, some foreign tunneling experts were building a subway at the time, and they were sent in to spearhead the rescue.
