Every Singaporean student would know about the Bukit Ho Swee Fire of 1961. Only the biggest outbreak of fire in local history, the disaster struck the squatter settlement of Bukit Ho Swee, claiming four lives and injuring 85 others. The blaze spread across 100 acres, destroying a school, shops, factories, and thousands of houses. It left some 16,000 people homeless as a result, and till this day, the cause of the fire has not been established.
Fifty-seven years since the inferno, a new batch of pictures shining more light on Singapore’s most calamitous blaze appeared on Facebook. Last month, local multi-disciplinary artist and founder of the Institute of Critical Zoologists Robert Zhao Renhui “got” a small envelope of photographs in London. Simply labeled “Disaster”, the package contained black-and-white snapshots of the Bukit Ho Swee Fire, presumably taken by a tourist who was in Singapore when it happened.
Take a look at the fiery aftermath, uploaded by Zhao on his Facebook page.
From the ashes
A combination of factors contributed to the fiery catastrophe on May 25, 1961. Houses in the squatter settlement — usually made of wood and attap — were cramped together. The fire initially started in Kampong Tiong Bahru, but spread across the road to Bukit Ho Swee, thanks to strong winds, while oil and petrol from nearby godowns served to intensify the blaze.
The day of the fire was the Hari Raya Haji public holiday, and since most of the firefighters and policemen back then comprised of Malay-Muslims, they had to be recalled to their duties via radio broadcasts. When they arrived at the scene, the low water pressure from fire hydrants in the area hampered firefighting efforts for an hour.
Access to the fire-struck areas was difficult — the congested layout of the housing settlements and the lack of crowd control made firefighting problematic. The battle was eventually won at night, but not before the inferno consumed the last cluster of attap huts in Delta Circus.
But the massive disaster was a pivotal moment for the development of modern public housing — the government moved to construct flats to house the victims of the fire in the first large-scale building project undertaken by the Housing Development Board. By 1967, 12,562 flats were built in the area, and all former residents of Bukit Ho Swee were successfully rehoused.
Reader Interactions