By Amanda Yong

SHE was on her way to help the needy, as she has done for years.

Yet, when she was knocked off her bicycle by falling cables, there was no one to help her.

Barely conscious, she managed to call her mother, who found her lying on the footpath an hour later, drenched in the light rain.

There had been a heavy downpour earlier that day, but despite the wet roads and slippery pavements, Miss Audrey Siew, 30, a teacher, had set off on her mercy mission.

She was cycling from Tampines to Pasir Ris, a regular route for her over the past five years, to deliver food items and herbal health boosters to needy elderly residents.

She would also help old folks move house, as she had done earlier that day, or simply lend a listening ear to the lonely people she came across.

She was pedalling at a leisurely pace when she was struck on the head by a bunch of telecommunications cables, around 4pm on 15 Oct.

The six cables, tied together, were as thick as a human fist. They had been strung across the footpath next to Pasir Ris Drive 8.

The impact was so strong that Miss Siew was flung off her bike and landed on her back, metres away.

Dazed, unable to move and in great pain, she drifted in and out of consciousness.

In one of her more lucid moments, she remembered that she had kept her handphone in the front pocket of her pants. She managed to reach into the pocket and pull it out.

Speaking to The New Paper from her bed at Mount Elizabeth Hospital last week, she said: "I took out my handphone; I just pressed any button."

Somehow she managed to call her mother. "I heard a ring and then my mother's voice," she said.

But she could hardly talk and recalls little of what followed. "All I can remember is that I was taken into an ambulance," she said.

Her mother, Madam Eunice Chew, 50, who works in the healthcare industry, said she immediately sensed something was wrong.

Madam Chew said in Mandarin: "She's usually quite loud on the phone, but when she called that day, she was speaking very softly.

Only two words

"She just said two words, 'mummy' and 'cable', and she sounded very weak."

Madam Chew said she spoke with her daughter in a mixture of Mandarin, Teochew and English.

"I said, 'Ah Girl, Ah Girl, what happened? Where are you?' I kept asking and asking, but she didn't reply," she said.

Realising she would not be getting any answers, Madam Chew hung up the phone.

She had a strong hunch about her daughter's whereabouts.

"I thought she might be in that part of Pasir Ris because we both do volunteer work in that area regularly," she said.

Frantic with worry, Madam Chew rushed to hail a cab from Tampines, where she was meeting customers.

She had no luck with the first two cabs that came her way.

"One (cab driver) wanted to change shift, so he refused to take me. Another was in a big hurry, so he also didn't want to drive me there," she said.

The third cab she flagged down took her to Pasir Ris.

"We went round and round Pasir Ris and I told the driver, 'Don't worry, I'll pay you as much as you want,' " said Madam Chew.

But they couldn't find her daughter.

Said Madam Chew: "Finally, I asked the driver to stop and I alighted so that I could walk around and look for my daughter."

By then the cab fare had come to nearly $20.

After walking around for about 10 minutes, Madam Chew spotted her daughter lying unconscious on the pavement.

She rushed to Miss Siew and shook her gently. Her daughter's eyes fluttered but she wouldn't wake up. Madam Chew immediately called an ambulance.

Miss Siew was taken to Changi General Hospital (CGH), where she was admitted with head and spine injuries. She was later transferred to Mount Elizabeth Hospital to seek specialist treatment.

Tears welled up in Madam Chew's eyes as she said: "I was very distressed. How would you feel if you see your daughter in such a state?"

But how could Miss Siew remain on the footpath for so long with no one going to help her?

Could there have been no pedestrians or cyclists passing that way for all of one hour that day?

While the footpath is next to a construction site, it can hardly be described as deserted. Bustling Pasir Ris Central, with its MRT station and White Sands shopping mall, is just a 15-minute walk away.

And there is sure to have been a lot of traffic on Pasir Ris Drive 8, which is next to the footpath.

When The New Paper was there at 4pm last Monday afternoon, we didn't spot any pedestrians, but we counted four cyclists on the footpath within a half-hour period.

As for vehicles on the road, some slowed down to look at what this reporter and photographer were doing there. But there was no one to help Miss Siew when she was knocked down.

The cables that hit her were put back up later that day, Madam Chew told The New Paper.

She said she passed the spot around 8pm, after leaving CGH, and saw two men hanging the cables onto poles.

No approval

The cables had been strung up between a pole located inside the construction site of Livia, a condominium development, and a pole affixed to a grass patch next to the pavement. The poles are near the junction of Pasir Ris Drive 8 and Pasir Ris Drive 1.

A Land Transport Authority (LTA) spokesman said: "Our preliminary investigations showed that the developer for the adjacent condominium development did not seek our approval to hang the cables."

LTA is following up with the developer on this matter, the spokesman added.

When contacted, condo developer City Developments Limited (CDL) said through a spokesman that its consultant and contractor, who is in charge of managing the site, have been alerted to the incident.

She said investigations are on with the contractor.

"We have always instructed our contractor that environmental, health and safety aspects are key priorities. Our contractor must ensure that the pole is structurally sound and the cables are properly secured," she said.

The architect for the project, Mr Ashvin Kumar, a director in Architects 61, said he was not aware of the incident until The New Paper contacted CDL.

He also did not know who put the cables back up.

"The contractors are currently tracing our records to ascertain what happened," he said.

This article was first published in The New Paper.