First, my deepest heartfelt condolence to the families of Dina Deve, Devatharshini and Divyashree. All three were victims of Kuala Dipang bridge incident. In the 10.40pm incident on 26th October 2009, about 22 pupils fell into te Sungai Kampar. They were among 298 students from 60 primary schools in Kampar, Tronoh and Batu Gajah involved in the programme organised by the Kinta Selatan District Education Department. The group was accompanied by 23 teachers.
Devatharshini, a pupil at SJK Tamil Mamban Diawan and Divyashree from Sekolah Kebangsaan Tamil (SRJK) Gopeng drowned together with 11-year-old N. Dina Deve on Monday night after they and 20 other pupils fell into Sungai Kampar when a suspension bridge collapsed as they were crossing it. The iron-cable bridge, suspended nine metres above the river, was built recently to replace an old one that had fallen apart with age.
The country has just lost future engineers, doctors, lawyers, accountants, entrepreneurs and above all, good citizens. The hopes of their parents were dashed in a split of a second.
It has become a sort of culture for us to react only after something had happen. Task force will be formed, investigations will be conducted, findings will be discussed, someone will be blamed and only God (if He exists) knows what happens after that. On the outset, funds will be set up and donations will be collected. Politicians from both the divide harp on the issue for few weeks for publicity. Insurance companies will raise all kinds of clauses in the policy which they never mentioned before selling it to the policyholder.
After a month the issue fades away. After a year, no one remembers it, except the victims.
Why can’t we be pro-active? Isn’t it better, if we prevent something bad from happening by taking the necessary precautions? It may cost money and time, but money and time spent on planning and development is never a waste.
Human lives are too precious to be lost in accidents, wars, fighting, and disease or in any other manner. We must learn from our past mistakes. This is where Knowledge Management needs to be applied. The findings and recommendations of past investigations and inquiries and their implementations should be kept in a repository, communicated, updated, enhanced and transferred among the relevant agencies. By doing so, the relevant agencies would have identified all danger zones and take necessary actions. In this case, just by placing a proper signboard on the maximum weight the bridge could take would have averted the loss of live of three young children.
The school authorities should get the Fire Department or any other rescue teams to accompany them whenever they go for a trip that involves camping or trekking. Members of the Fire Department or rescue teams are well trained and usually able to identify and avoid dangers.
The Ministry of Education may come up with certain measures to avoid recurrence of this incident. It may provide basic survival skills for teachers. These teachers in turn provide trainings for students. Other relevant agencies can be roped in for assistance. Back in the 80’s when I was in the Red Crescent Society in my school, the Army, the Fire Department and the Hospital provided us various types of trainings ranging from Artificial Resuscitation to Disaster Relief to treating accident victims.
Many things can be done. But the most important thing is, we must value life and have the will to avert loss of life.
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