Deaths of recruit and officer cadet: Defence Minister issues statement
Deaths of recruit and officer cadet: Defence Minister issues statement
Minister for Defence Teo Chee Hean said:
“I would like to express my deep condolences to the families of the late Rec Andrew Cheah Wei Siong and the late OCT Clifton Lam Jia Hao.
I am saddened by the loss of two young and precious sons of Singapore.
I support the decision of the SAF to take a time-out on physical and endurance training for 3 days. This will allow the SAF to review and refocus on such activities to ensure that proper procedures are in place and being followed, before such training resumes.
While the SAF needs to carry out realistic training, this will be done without compromise to safety.”
-According to AsiaOne News:
Army recruit collapses and dies during training walk
(11 June 2008)
AN ARMY recruit collapsed and died on Pulau Tekong yesterday morning, barely five days into his national service.
Twenty-year-old Andrew Cheah Wei Siong, who graduated from the Nanyang Polytechnic three weeks ago today, was then doing a 2km training walk at the Basic Military Training Centre on the island.
He enlisted last Thursday and was placed on an enhanced 15-week basic military training (BMT) programme meant for mildly obese recruits.
Mr Cheah is also understood to have had asthma when he was young.
According to a BMT guide for recruits, this programme is for those whose body mass index exceeds 27 and who failed to attain the silver or gold standard in the pre-enlistment physical fitness test.
A statement from the Defence Ministry (Mindef) said Mr Cheah was taking part in the walk when he fainted at the 1.2km mark at 8.35am. He had started on the walk at 8am.
He was given immediate medical attention.
About 50 minutes later, a decision was made to send him to the Singapore General Hospital by helicopter.
During the flight, Singapore Armed Forces (SAF) medical staff continued to try to resuscitate him but failed.
He was pronounced dead at 10.50am at the hospital.
The Straits Times understands that he was not evacuated to Changi General Hospital, which is nearest the island, because of air traffic conditions, among other factors.
Read the full article at AsiaOne News
- Almost cried after I read these article as it could have been me dead in Army as I too have Asthma since young and was given the Pes-B combat fit status after going to check up in CMBP enlistment almost 11 years back…I too had been over-weight and given the extra-long enhanced basic military training (BMT).
In the period of 2 and a half years, I was downgraded 2 times from Pes-B combat fit to Pes-C2L2 Store man (Signal) and finally to Pes-C9L2 as clerk as I was diagnosed with chronic asthmatic and allergic to dust mites and peanuts.
In BMT, I saw someone that almost look like the poor recruit!! He was very weak in BMT and was “Te-kan” (punished) every single day. I ever saw the PC ask him to carry pails of water up the stairs in front of everyone. He can’t march properly and extremely quiet guy…and fought hard to even pass out from BMT.
I was lucky as I almost died with high fever and stayed in the army medical center for 5 full days and freak out my platoon commander but he did tried his best to train me up to health after that. The problem is my recurring wheezing during training and had to be taken out for safety but at that time they don’t know I am affected by dust (dirty bunks, area cleaning) and cause my health to deteriorate over time.
The training sometimes include going to super cold air-conditioned rooms after a good sweaty chains of multiple-push up, chin-ups and fast march around the area. This had cause many cases of fever, flu and activate my asthma as well and cannot fully train my body.
These chain of unhealthy practices such as passing someone with past illness (possibly deadly) as combat fit and bad training practices to impact the soldier’s well being almost 11 years ago.
For now, I had not spoke with any new recruits yet but from what I know…they are having much better accommodation (sturdy non-squeaky beds, big wardrobe, clean rooms) in Tekong. The food also much better as they have out-sourced the cooking as well. They have proper “feedback” channels to speak out their woes and unhappiness which we seldom utilized due to fear.
You see, back in BMT then…small ranks like sergeants are like Jesus and platoon commander is God. We scream out salutation from far away to avoid being punished, but seriously it may be a ploy to select “potential” to be officer cadets.
Great memories are in the army and it will take forever to tell in a blog. My suggestion is to up-root the root cause of the problem…the pes-status which determine their fitness before enlistment to this compulsory national service.
If I was given Pes-C2L2 in the beginning, I won’t be suffering from chronic asthmatic after army and had to under-go several asthma attack whereas almost zero before army.
Hey, I did almost black out during their Mini-IPPT test at CMPB before enlistment….still I was passed as pes-B combat fit. This makes me wonder if the doctor there are qualified to determine if someone is qualified to be combat fit or not. The training is tough as expected and there will be no excuse to back out after the PC lashes out the commands and punishment.
Overall, army is still a good place to build personal character and perseverance. I wish all the best for future army boys to take care of themselves and fear not to speak out when you are not feeling well. The very act of speaking out and saying you don’t feel well before a route march or exercise may save your life.
Saving your own life is more important than saving face or avoiding punishment.
