Elderly cyclist killed in bus accident
Her friend was on the bus when she heard a commotion.
Passengers were shouting at the bus driver to stop.
An elderly cyclist was on the ground, the lower half of his body pinned beneath the front of the bus.
"My friend initially thought there was someone fighting on the bus. But she later realised someone had been knocked down," Madam Janet Teo, 65, a housewife, told The New Paper.
"After the accident, my friend was very scared and quickly left after everyone alighted."
The accident happened on Sunday morning.
The Singapore Civil Defence Force (SCDF) said it received a call at 11.38am and immediately deployed a Red Rhino and an ambulance to the junction of Marine Crescent and Marine Parade Road.
SCDF officers took five minutes to free the 87-year-old cyclist from under the bus, an SBS Transit service 196.
FRACTURES
The elderly man was sent conscious to Changi General Hospital with lower limb fractures, an SCDF spokesman said.
A police spokesman told TNP that he later died in hospital.
A passer-by, Mr Samson Zee, 45, said he was in a taxi when he passed by the accident site. About 25 people had gathered on the left side of the bus, he added.
"Four SCDF personnel were looking under the bus and examining ways to rescue the old man," he added.
Madam Cao Hong Yan, 38, who lives at Block 47, Marine Crescent, an HDB block that faces the junction where the accident happened, told TNP: "When my husband drove past the accident site, I saw the bicycle crushed by the bus and I was so shocked."
Another resident in the same block, Madam Abu Bakar, said it was not the first time an accident had occured at the junction.
The 42-year-old housewife said: "That junction is prone to accidents.
"There are minor accidents there every three to four months."
Ms Tammy Tan, Senior Vice-President of Corporate Communications for SBS Transit, said: "We are very sad that this has happened.
"We are already in touch with the family to render assistance as best we can. We are also assisting the police in their investigations."
Four SCDF personnel were looking under the bus and examining ways to rescue the old man.
- Mr Samson Zee, a passer-by
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