You don’t read news like this often.

Fire in a food court? 4,000 people evacuated from the entire shopping mall?

Here’s what happened.

Fire in Tampines’ Century Square Food Court Led to 4,000 People Evacuating

This afternoon, at around 4.10pm, a fire broke out in Century Square food court, which is simply called The Food Market.

The fire involved a floor cleaning machine, but more details about the cause of the fire is still under investigation. Did they buy it from Taobao or what?

As a precautionary measure, the mall decided to evacuate everyone in the mall—even the workers.

By the time the SCDF arrived, the fire has been extinguished by an unsung hero: the sprinklers.

Yes, these things that you don’t care about until a disaster strikes.

Thankfully, there was no reported injuries.

According to a Stomper, there was also a loud “explosion” before the fire occurred.

By 5.45pm, the workers started to re-enter the mall to clean up. At 6.17pm, the mall is reopened to the public, though some shops remained closed. The food court will remain close until further notice, so if you intend to makan there tomorrow, head down to the other mall that’s just a stone’s throw away instead.

Over in social media, people have been posting videos of the incident, because that’s what we do best during a fire:

Now, PMD fires might be everywhere, but it seems like mall fires are confined to the east.

Tampines Mall Suffered the Same Fate in April This Year

If you’d have remembered, back in April this year, a fire broke out in the mall atrium (i.e. the open area) in Tampines Mall. It was described as a “small fire”, but a man has to be sent to the hospital.

The fire was then put out by shoppers.

I don’t know about you, but it feels like the two malls use the same social media agency.

I mean, spot the difference between these two posts:

Maybe I was wrong in my introduction. This could be common after all?