He heard a loud bang coming from his block in Yishun where lift upgrading was being carried out.
This was followed by frantic shouting and the sound of running feet.
A resident who wanted to be known only as Mr Sinniah, 90, rushed out of his flat and looked over the common corridor parapet.
To his horror, he saw the body of a Indian construction worker lying in a drain.
"I have never heard the sound of a body hitting the ground after a fall.
"I thought at first that some equipment had fallen off the platform," he said.
At about 4.10pm yesterday, a construction worker fell from the eighth-storey lift landing of Block 107, Yishun Ring Road.
The block had been undergoing lift upgrading by Kienta Engineering Construction.
"It was a chilling sound," said Mr Sinniah, who lives on the seventh storey of that block.
A spokesman for the Singapore Civil Defence Force (SCDF) confirmed receiving a call at 4.22pm and dispatched an ambulance.
Paramedics certified the man was dead and handed the case to the police.
MOM also present
Officers from MOM's Occupational Safety and Health Inspectorate went to the site to investigate.
The worker had been assisting another construction worker who was operating welding equipment.
The MOM spokesman said he was reportedly retrieving an electrical cable hanging over the safety barricades at the side of the lift landing before he fell. The safety rails that straddled the platform fell with him.
When contacted, a police spokesmansaid they received a call at about 4.30pm. Upon arrival, they found the body of an Indian national in his 20s.
The case has been classified as unnatural death and investigations are ongoing.
A co-worker gave the dead man's name as Mr Dinoth Kumar. He said Mr Kumar, 24, had worked in Singapore for more than two years and had been with Kienta Engineering Construction for about eight months.
The co-worker said: "When he fell, he landed in a drain. The worker on the eighth storey who was using the welding machinery and another friend helped lift his body out of the drain."
He said that Mr Kumar had two younger brothers and elderly parents back in India.
MOM has instructed Kienta Engineering Construction to stop work at the accident scene.
When approached, a safety officer from the company declined to comment.
A resident known only as Madam Ros, 55, an odd-job worker who lives on the seventh storey, said: "I saw an ambulance arrive and paramedics rushing out.
"When I saw them return empty-handed without a stretcher or a body, I knew that he didn't make it."
This article was first published in The New Paper.
