By: Celine Lim, Zaihan Mohamed Yusof, Charlene Chua, Juliana June Rasul, Pearly Tan, Han Su-Ying, Ervina Mohamed Jamil, Han Yongming, Kay Tan, Jovita Chua, Benita Aw Yeong, Hoe Pei Shan and Nurul Asyikin Mohd Nasir

Frozen by fear

SHE stood rooted in the lobby when the bomb blast ripped through the lounge area on the same floor at Jakarta's Ritz-Carlton hotel.

Singaporean Fayy Ang was in the hotel lobby making arrangements to check out.

From where she stood she could see the damage to the lounge where guests have their breakfast.

Dazed, she just stood there. She had never seen anything like it. Her mind could not process what her eyes were seeing.

Seeing her like that prompted a hotel employee to shake her and get her away from the danger.

Ms Ang told The New Paper last night at Changi Terminal 2 after she arrived home: 'I did not manage to check out of the hotel. There was no time.

'An alert staff member had pulled me to safety out of the lobby. He even carried my luggage. All he kept saying to me was 'please leave, please leave'.'

Though Ms Ang didn't know it, the explosion at the Ritz-Carlton was the second of two yesterday.

A few minutes earlier, a bomb had gone off at the basement of the J W Marriott across the street.

Added Ms Ang, a procurement manager for DHL: 'I didn't hear anybody screaming, but I saw people covered in white dust and a man who was injured in the leg. The scene was chaotic because people were rushing out to get to the open field outside the hotel.'

Rocked by fear

While Ms Ang was being evacuated to the field outside, another Singaporean staying in the same hotel was still up in her room.

Ms Teri Ho was half asleep when she heard a faint 'boom' around 7.50am.

She did not think much of it, said the 38-year-old sales director, who was on the 25th floor of the Ritz-Carlton.

Minutes later, Ms Ho was jolted from her sleep by a louder blast. The entire hotel rocked.

Her first thought: It was an earthquake.

Said Ms Ho: 'I thought it was a tremor at first. I wasn't scared, though I saw smoke coming from the ground floor.'

But her sense of security was soon shattered.

About 15 minutes later, hotel security banged on her door and said she needed to be evacuated.

She took only her passport, mobile phone and wallet.

At the ground floor she was met by scenes of carnage. The bite of cordite filled the air.

Debris and pieces of glass were strewn all over the hotel lobby, especially near the badly-damaged lounge, she said.

Added Ms Ho, who had been in Jakarta on a business trip with another colleague: 'Only then, (did) I suspect that it was a terrorist attack.

'I started to think about my family. I really wanted to go home.'

Ms Ho was evacuated to the field, where others were making frantic telephone calls to family and friends.

Both women were unhurt.

Later, investigators would reveal that at least two explosions had gone off almost simultaneously at the two luxury hotels.

By mid-afternoon, the death toll stood at eight dead and 50 people injured.

Driven by fear

One Briton, who was close to the epicentre of the Ritz-Carlton blast, considered himself 'blessed' for emerging unscathed.

Around 6.50am, Mr Mike Causey was having breakfast at the Airlangga restaurant.

He then waited at the lobby for his friends to check out.

And then everything shook.

He was standing less than 30m from the blast. Remarkably, he was not injured.

He dived for cover behind tables in the lobby.

Said Mr Causey, a compliance manager: 'If I had stayed longer at the restaurant, I would surely have been injured.

'Several hours after the explosion, my ears were still ringing.'

He made his way to the open field while police cordoned off the blast area.

The injured, both local and foreign, were taken to hospitals in Jakarta.

According to International SOS, which deals with emergency evacuation of the injured, some foreigners were evacuated to Singapore, while more were standing by to be flown to Singapore last night.

According to an International SOS spokesman, one Singaporean man was injured and waiting to be evacuated to Singapore.

--TNP

This article was first published in The New Paper.