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Tuesday, December 09, 2008

The lemons at Bukit Antarabangsa

Malaysiakini - 'She would be alive if they had helped'

A sad tale of tragic death, accusations of callous, apathetic and unhelpful rescue personnel, and looting of a damaged house in the Bukit Antarabangsa landslide.

Malaysiakini reported:

In a frantic attempt to save his wife, a 31-year-old executive was forced to dig through the earth with his bare hands until his fingers bled.

He felt a sense of relief when rescue personnel arrived at the scene. But to his horror, they refused to help him, apart from throwing him a spade.
[…]

Naturally, the Selangor Police Chief Khalid Abu Bakar rejected the accusation, explaining that it might well be that some rescue personnel (those who were alleged to have thrown the spade to the frantic husband) were untrained and thus not allowed to conduct certain rescue operations.

He averred he found it hard to believe that rescue personnel would have acted in such a cold-hearted manner.

He said: "You don't expect an ambulance driver to save a buried victim. He is not trained, so if we request untrained personnel for help and they refuse, we shouldn't blame them.”

"This is because their lives are in danger too. I think we should respect their decision. To dig and save someone, one has to be trained. For an untrained person, it's a very dangerous task."

Then, …

The father in law of the victim claimed that when he returned to the house on Sunday morning, he was shocked to discover several men in uniform lying on his bed, smoking and drinking his wine. He said he lost 80 bottles of expensive wine worth RM160,000 and six watches worth RM180,000.

He lamented despairingly: "One of them had even asked me whether I still wanted these things, if not I should give it to them. Later, my wife and I examined our safety box and found it opened. Several branded watches and jewellery were missing."

Just last night a sweetie and I were talking about how well our soldiers have responded to the emergency, perhaps even risking their lives in the rescue operations.

I am not in a position to verify the accusations of the victim’s family but those have left a sour taste in our mouths.

I hope the Selangor CPO will conduct a thorough inquiry – that’s all we can hope for. The police can’t bring back the dead but we hope they will at least bring closure for the victim’s family by a fair, frank and fearless investigation.

22 comments:

  1. we've heard a few complaints so far regarding the incident in Bukit Antarabangsa.

    the most complaints i've heard was the fear of the residents of their belonging being stolen by thief since few stuff had already been missing since the evacuation started.

    i've read in a newspaper that 2 Myanmar people posed as the military.the two Myanmar actually was hired by a resident to collect the belonging at the resident's house.but the doubtful part is why wear military outfit?

    also there are call of not wanting some political hot shot to visit the ground zero in order to gain popularity.

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  2. Naturally, the Selangor Police Chief Khalid Abu Bakar rejected the accusation, explaining that it might well be that some rescue personnel (those who were alleged to have thrown the spade to the frantic husband) were untrained and thus not allowed to conduct certain rescue operations.
    ===========================

    If the person is not trained in rescue, then why is he there?

    Is he trying to say the rescuers need somebody to carry the changkul and spade for them????

    Is the Selangor Police Chief Khalid trained in emergency rescue??? If not why is he there?

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  3. It is not surprise that Bolehland volunters are worse than criminals. Each time when there is an incident you see them there NOT to help the victims BUT are there to help to steal victims belonging. Each time they say they will investigate but what happen after that. The answer is the victims are lying, our men are
    " clean" so no issue. Standard answer. So if the volunters are not competent to help, why are they around? to steal ????????????

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  4. sekarang ini banyak pihak yang menuding jari antara satu sama lain untuk mencari siapa yang bertanggujawab atas insiden di Bukit Antarabangsa.

    malah Khir Toyo dan Khalid juga bercakaran berhubung siapa yang patut dipersalahkan.

    benda dah lepas.kita belajar sajalah dari pengalaman.yang terasa bersalah tu,terima jelah kenyataan dan tanggunglah sendiri apa yang dia dah buat.dalam hal ini kita boleh rumuskan kecuaian manusia dan bencana alam semulajadi yang menjadi faktor dalam insiden Bukit Antarabangsa.

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  5. "If the person is not trained in rescue, then why is he there?"

    I think you have been misled by kt's inaccurate paraphrasing. The Selangor Chief Police (who has done an excellent job leading the rescue effort) said that those personnel are probably paramedics or ambulance drivers. In other words, they are part of the rescue effort but they are not trained to dig through rubble.

    It is standard procedure in rescue operation to disallow medical personnel from meddling with the rubble. One wrong piece moved could worsen the pile-up. Victims easily reached by trained professional suddenly become impossible to save.

    The medical personnel had to make an agonizing decision. To follow SOP or to follow their humanity. They made the choice to hand the spade to the desperate man and went ahead with their assigned task. An acceptable middle ground.

    Next time we shouldn't jump to conclusion and think ill of the brave rescue personnel.

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  6. of course khalid will say victim lying n govt personnel r right( even before knowing who they r)
    y wud a victim who has just lost a loved one lie over such trivial matters?
    this is the fellow who denied video evidence
    sent in thugs of police 2 attack rakyat singing negaraku
    deemed t-shirts n candles as more dangerous than water cannons n batons
    said no prayers without permits
    allowed bodowi, altanajis n muhyiddin while disallowing opposition leader anwar ibrahim from visiting disaster area
    pakatan rakyat, when we take over d govt, we know what 2 do with him

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  7. FOR FUCK SAKE.. GOD DAMN "ANONYMOUS"!!!! ARE YOU PR FROM UMNO!!!??

    QUOTE FROM ANONYMOUS "The medical personnel had to make an agonizing decision. To follow SOP or to follow their humanity. They made the choice to hand the spade to the desperate man and went ahead with their assigned task. An acceptable middle ground."

    QUOTE FROM NEWS "He felt a sense of relief when rescue personnel arrived at the scene. But to his horror, they refused to help him, apart from throwing him a spade."

    WHAT THAT GUY SAW WAS RESCUE PERSONNEL!!!!! GOD DAMN RESCUE PERSONNEL!!!!! WHO THREW A SPADE FOR HIM TO DIG HIS OWN WIFE OUT!!!!! GOD DAMN IT!!!!!

    YOU SHOULD DIE!!!!!! DIE!!!!!!! WITH UMNO AND BN FOR GOD DAMN FUCK SAKE!!!!!!!!

    IF I WERE THERE I WOULD HAVE HELPED HIM DIG HIS WIFE OUT!!!!! EVEN UNTIL MY HANDS BLEED!!!!!

    THE AUTHORITIES ARE GOING INSANE!!!!!!!! GOD DAMN INSANE!!!!!!!! YOU CANT TRUST ANY OF THEM ANYMORE!!!!! POLICE, RESCUE TEAM, THEY ARE DEMONSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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  8. I am the anonymous that FUTURE is referring to. I will ignore the unwarranted accusation and angry outburst. I look at things objectively and don't demonize brave people who risked their lives to save others.

    "QUOTE FROM NEWS "He felt a sense of relief when rescue personnel arrived at the scene. But to his horror, they refused to help him, apart from throwing him a spade.""

    The person was in shock and disoriented, he could have easily mistaken a paramedic for a rescue digger.

    Paramedics are usually the first on the scene in an emergency. They apply immediate first aid to victims. So lets not demonize these brave men and women when they are doing their jobs.

    Look at the situation objectively and do not demonize people so quickly.

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  9. A paramedic would not simply throw a spade at the husband. A paramedic should know better. He is trained to recognize that the husband is also a victim under the circumstances, who is even more "untrained" to rescue even his own wife. The Selangor CPO is talking nonsense. If it was a paramedic, why didn't the paramedic at least attend to the distraught husband??

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  10. I am again the anonymous from above.

    Remember that a paramedic job is to give medical attention.

    Being the first to arrive at ground zero, the number of seriously injured outnumbered the paramedics. The seriously injured took higher priority than the husband whose injury was relatively minor.

    The paramedics also have to make the agonizing decision of saving people they can reach first. Sympathizing with the husband, the outnumbered paramedics handed the husband a spade, as they look for victims who are easier to be reached.

    This is the grim reality of the decisions rescue personnel have to make. Especially at the first moments when personnel arrived at the rescue site.

    I do not know for sure what happened but the scenario I described is more probable than the cold, heartless rescuers scenario. Because if it was the latter, then the death toll would have skyrocketed, and we would have a bigger tragedy in our hands.

    I'm distraught at the length some people go to demonize the rescue workers. I've heard baseless accusations that rescuers have an "abandon Chinese policy".

    We must understand rescuers too make honest human mistake and have to make difficult decision in time of desperation and crisis. Jumping at the first opportunity to paint ill these brave persons is not fair and disregard their sacrifice.

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  11. quote "I think you have been misled by kt's inaccurate paraphrasing" unquote:

    Anon, please show me where I have misquoted MKINI on which I based my post. I believe I have been extremely fair.

    I even wrote: "Just last night a sweetie and I were talking about how well our soldiers have responded to the emergency, perhaps even risking their lives in the rescue operations.

    I am not in a position to verify the accusations of the victim’s family but those have left a sour taste in our mouths.

    I hope the Selangor CPO will conduct a thorough inquiry – that’s all we can hope for. The police can’t bring back the dead but we hope they will at least bring closure for the victim’s family by a fair, frank and fearless investigation."


    I'd be most grateful if you can show me how or where I have misled readers.

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  12. If the paramedic was not trained to use a spade, then how come he had a spade to throw at the husband? Or somebody else "trained" to do some digging should have been nearby. Why didn't the "paramedic" call someone to assist? You are looking for buried victims, and here's one with her hand sticking out. Is't she easy enough to reach. No, as much as I would like to think the best of our so-called rescuers, I don't buy the lame excuse of the CPO nor can I accept pleadsings on his behalf by "Anonymous". Saya berdoa semoga Allah membalas mereka yang zalim ini dengan balasan yang setimpal.

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  13. Hmm.. in a disaster area, there will be three zones : red zones, yellow zones and green zones. Let say in a landslide where the building collapse (the centre of the disaster, usually where the trapped victim are), this will classified as RED zone. ONLY rescue personel are allowed to enter this area, usually Firefighters, SMART Team, JPA 3 and all that. They will deliver the victims to the yellow zone where the paramedics are allowed. In this case, i wonder why a paramedic is there (with spades pulak tu) where a victim is trapped. And ambulance driver?? why in hell should they be around with spades? And the husband should be brought to the green zones (safe zone)!!! a thorough explaination should be done!! my heart goes to our dear friends who were affected by the tragedy.

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  14. In 2006, rescue personnel demanded money from the flood victims in Johor while the PM WAS OPENING HIS NASI KANDAR STALL in Perth. Now, LANDSLIDE VICTIMS have to pay to the rescue personnel. Why do we pay taxes for?

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  15. the keyword is s,o,p...

    they're following standard procedure, and they are not suparman.....

    donno if to respect or to disgust this type of reply...

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  16. medical personnels do not carry ~SPADE~ around!!

    The victim was trapped a few metres away from the so called "rescue team"

    and NO!!, NO!! NO!! NO!!, the victim's husband was not disoriented!! people dont get disoriented so easily just like what that "anonymous guy" who tried so hard to save the integrity of the authority said.

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  17. The only reason I can think of is that some of the "rescue personnel" were not there to rescue the victims, but rather to gain entry into the victims' homes and make a fast buck. In simple language, they are thieves and should be shot on the spot as they do with looters.

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  18. The CPO seems are not trained to use both his right and left brain. But if you have some big shot in "peace hill" shooting up stupid statement, you can't blame him for defensively shooting blank.

    In fact, I doubt there is enough police personnel to guard the ground zero. It is pretty common sense those Bolehland police that well train on SHOOTING WATER CANON, TEAR GAS, HARASSING REAL NGO, are not train on securing ground zero.

    Wanna bet RM0.20 with me? I bet that Bolehland police force does not have ANY emergency plan. Honestly, Bomber,professional relief body such as Red cross, Tsuchi are more competent than Bolehland police in disaster.

    If the police head keep playing "saving face", they will never improve their image nor their profession.

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  19. kt

    is this not the same fella who lied big time about the vigil incident in PJ? still want to trust him?

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  20. F*ck the police, F*ck UMNO, F*ck PKR, F*ck MPAJ, F*ck Ktemoc.

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  21. "I hope the Selangor CPO will conduct a thorough inquiry – that’s all we can hope for. The police can’t bring back the dead but we hope they will at least bring closure for the victim’s family by a fair, frank and fearless investigation. "

    Wouldn't hold my breath waiting for this to happen bud. Sickening situation.

    ps F*ck Anonymous 10:57. Get a life ass.

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