A 40-year-old bus driver was allegedly “dragged, pushed and manhandled” by a group of workers while ferrying them from Woodlands back to their dormitory in Jurong on Sep. 13.

The incident occurred after the allegedly intoxicated workers got into a brawl among themselves on board the 49-seater bus, prompting Cai Zhi Feng to pull over and refuse to continue the journey.

According to Cai, the migrant workers then “manhandled” him, forcing him to continue driving.

Videos of the incident were posted on Facebook on the same day by the owner of the bus chartering service, Singapore Bus Charter, Jitesh Dhillon.

Fight broke out on return journey

Speaking to Mothership, Cai said he had picked up the workers as part of an ad-hoc job order to ferry them to and from a company gathering.

At around 10:30am, Cai picked up the workers from Jurong Penjuru Dormitory and drove them to Woodlands Link for the gathering.

He said the journey there "went smoothly".

At around 4pm, Cai picked them up from Woodlands Link for the return journey to their dormitory. He said many of the workers were "heavily intoxicated" when they boarded the bus.

There was no site supervisor on board at the time, he added.

An argument broke out among the workers shortly after they boarded and escalated into what Cai described as a "full bus brawl" minutes after the bus departed.

Driver allegedly "dragged, pushed & manhandled"

"I urged them to stop but no one listened," Cai told Mothership.

He subsequently pulled over and asked the workers to get off the bus, telling them that he could not continue driving safely and would call the police if the fighting continued.

After the bus stopped, Cai said some of the workers "dragged, pushed and manhandled" him while trying to force him to resume driving.

Another photo posted online by Jitesh showed a worker grabbing Cai's face.

He then told the workers that he had called the police and could not safely continue the journey.

Continued fighting outside

The scuffle continued after Cai pulled over.

Another clip showed several workers outside the bus pushing and shoving one another.

According to Cai, the fight only subsided after a supervisor from the workers' company arrived.

He told Mothership that he kept video evidence of the incident and handed it over to the police when officers arrived.

He subsequently left after the police finished speaking to the parties involved.

Mothership understands that there are no current investigations ongoing at this time.

Experienced some pain and discomfort

Though Cai said he did not sustain any "obvious injuries", he said he "experienced some pain and discomfort" following the incident.

"I was frightened because they treated me in a rude manner," he told Mothership.

He added that he did not know if any of the workers were also injured.

To his knowledge, Cai said the workers’ company is conducting an internal investigation into the incident.

As of Sep. 16, the bus driver of 11 years told Mothership he has not received any compensation.

First fight encountered by bus company

Jitesh told Mothership that this was the first fight the company had encountered on one of its buses.

He said he shared the videos "to raise awareness of the situations faced by public service vehicle operators".

However, Jitesh said he was disturbed by some comments on his Facebook post that had turned the incident into a racial or nationality issue.

"This was not why the video was made public," he said, adding that he hoped residents would not use the incident against others.

Jitesh said the company does not wish to pursue the matter further.

He said he hopes the individuals involved will be given a warning and will not be prosecuted.

"We will just take the damages of the bus in our stride and move on from here. We are not looking for any compensation," he said.

Jitesh added that he hopes "better processes and regulations" can be put in place for construction companies ferrying workers when alcohol is provided freely.

A Malaysian teenager was the cause of a traffic accident in Penang on Sep. 15 2026.

The 14-year-old, according to Sin Chew Daily, stole a pair of car keys from a place of worship and drove the car alone.

It was not mentioned what the teen's motive was.

In a viral video shared on Malaysian social media, the teenager's car was seen to have stopped in the middle of the road.

A passer-by attempted to open the driver's door and restrain the teenager, but before he could act, the car sped forward and crashed into another vehicle.

All 3 vehicles damaged

According to Malay Mail, the teenager first crashed into a parked vehicle on the roadside shortly after gaining control of the car.

Afterwards, they continued driving and ended up driving against the flow of traffic on a one-way road, where the video was captured.

They then crashed into another car on the opposite side of the lane.

Sin Chew stated that a metal beam was also damaged at the adjacent food court in the crash.

Passers-by were subsequently able to stop the car, and the police were notified.

The teenager was reportedly crying loudly in the car after the incident. Their father, brother, and tutor were informed and arrived at the crash site after.

Local police chief Nik Aminuddin said that all three vehicles involved were damaged, but no injuries were recorded, reported Malay Mail.

He also added that investigations are ongoing and urged parents and guardians to keep an eye on their children.

Sin Chew reported that the teenager is suspected to have an intellectual disability.

While Sin Chew stated that the teenager was a girl, other media outlets such as Malay Mail reported that he was a boy.

NTUC members can now enjoy up to two complimentary admissions to Sentosa per month.

In a Facebook post on Sep. 16, NTUC assistant secretary-general Melvin Yong said the move was part of “ongoing efforts to stretch the value of NTUC membership”.

“Whether it is spending time with loved ones at the beach, exploring Sentosa's attractions, or simply taking a break from the daily hustle, we want members to be able to make the most of what their membership offers,” Yong, who is also Member of Parliament (MP) for Radin Mas SMC, added.

NTUC members can claim up to two complimentary island admission e-vouchers per month.

A new e-voucher will be released on the first day of every month.

The vouchers are valid on any day, including weekends and public holidays.

Both vouchers can also be used on the same day.

Members can link their NTUC Membership to their Islander account through the MySentosa app.

Neighbours at a Woodlands public housing block got together to put out a fire that broke out at a corridor and evacuate other residents on Sep. 14.

They managed to extinguish the flames using hose reels before the Singapore Civil Defence Force (SCDF) arrived.

In response to Mothership's queries, the SCDF said they were alerted to a fire at Block 693B Woodlands Avenue 6 at about 9:35pm that night.

It involved a shoe rack along the common corridor on the eighth floor.

Jumped into action

Faith Chong, who lived with her family on the eighth floor, shouted when she realised there was a fire.

It had broken out near the unit at the very end of the corridor, she told Mothership.

"[I] alerted my husband who's at home," she said. "Then I called the phone of the neighbour who lives closest to the fire because I knew she was at home with her mother-in-law and two young kids."

Her husband acted fast, grabbing a fire extinguisher in their house.

Videos shared by Chong showed her husband rushing towards a huge blaze, then spraying a fire extinguisher at it while Chong yelled at him to be careful.

The smoke was thick to the point that when the couple blew their noses, they noticed that their mucus was black, she said.

After the flames died down, her husband quickly helped to evacuate the family from the affected unit.

Kampung spirit

Soon, several other residents went over to help.

They were shocked and scared, Chong said.

But in her videos, they appeared calm as they pulled a communal fire hose and carried pails towards the affected unit.

Many of them were young men, who held towels or their shirts over their noses to avoid inhaling the smoke.

Chong, who posted the videos of the incident on Instagram, wrote in her caption that she was "really proud of her husband" for taking action.

She was also moved by how her neighbours gathered and worked together.

"Really love the kampung spirit we have amongst our Admiralty Grove," she said.

According to the SCDF, there were no reported injuries.

The cause of the fire is under investigation.

A professor in China has come under hot water after his daughters, 15 and 20, published an 86-page exposé of his alleged decade-long affair with a student.

47-year-old Fu Lei, a former professor at Wuhan University, has allegedly maintained an improper relationship with 35-year-old Zeng Mengqi since 2016, even after her marriage.

Meanwhile, he had allegedly left his wife and daughters to fend for themselves.

Zeng is now a professor at Wuhan University, while Fu currently serves as the vice principal at Anhui University and is a member of the Party Committee’s standing committee, reported South China Morning Post.

The exposé also contains allegations of the pair's academic misconduct.

Both universities have stated that they are looking into the allegations.

Decade-long affair

The sisters reportedly found out about Fu's affair in 2018, when they were aged seven and 12.

They saw that Fu used the Japanese anime character Conan as his online avatar, while Zeng used Ai Haibara, another character from the show.

Fu was apparently quick to respond to Zeng’s requests, even during family holidays, while Zeng would send "provoking messages" to their mother.

According to Mirror Daily, Zeng had also allegedly photoshopped herself into a picture of the two in a press release on the university's website.

The pair is also accused of misappropriating university research funds for their personal use.

In addition, the question of Zeng's quick rise from her PhD in 2018 to making professor in 2021 was also brought to light.

Zeng also allegedly deprived other students of first authorship on publications while using Fu as a ghostwriter for her academic journal articles.

Left his wife

In 2022, during a family trip to Hunan, the eldest daughter apparently witnessed Zeng hiding in the passenger seat of Fu's car.

Fu left home that night and never returned, according to Mirror Daily.

This left their mother to manage the mortgage and take care of them alone, the two sisters revealed.

Their mother apparently lost 15kg as a result.

It was only after the older sister confronted Fu at a university leadership meeting that he agreed to sign an agreement of 5,000 yuan (S$951) in monthly child support.

This was despite Fu’s annual salary exceeding one million yuan (S$190,364).

A former physical education (PE) teacher at a secondary school in Singapore, who committed sexual acts on his student when she was a minor, was sentenced on Sep. 16 to 16 years' jail and 12 strokes of the cane.

An earlier report mentioned that the man had pursued the student romantically when she was between 14 and 15 years old.

Pleaded guilty

The Straits Times (ST) previously reported that the 45-year-old man pleaded guilty to three counts of sexual penetration of a minor on Jul. 23.

Another 12 sexual offence charges were taken into consideration during sentencing, according to ST.

At the time, the man paused for a while and "heaved a sigh" before replying that he admitted to the statement of facts read out in court by the prosecution, ST noted.

He cannot be named due to a gag order to protect the identity of the victim, who is now 18.

Taught victim in school, got close online

The man taught the victim in 2022. They later followed each other on Instagram.

According to ST, the man began professing his romantic feelings for her and repeatedly asked her to be his girlfriend.

Knowing it was wrong to be in a relationship with a teacher, the girl said that she needed time to think about it.

However, the man insisted that it was not wrong as long as it did not affect her studies, despite their 28-year age gap.

Began relationship

The girl eventually became convinced that it was acceptable for them to be in a romantic relationship.

On Aug. 29, the girl told the man that she felt guilty for making him wait and was willing to be in a relationship with him, ST reported.

The relationship eventually culminated in sexual acts.

On Sep. 11, 2022, the pair met at a hotel where the man carried out various sex acts on her.

He also repeatedly asked her to carry out a sex act on him until she agreed to do so.

Victim ended relationship

On Jan. 29, the girl ended the relationship after feeling that the man was becoming very possessive. According to ST, he cried and threatened to pull out all his hair.

He also texted the victim's friends to find out if she was seeing anyone.

One of the victim's friends eventually told school officials after finding out that she had been in a relationship with the man.

During questioning, he admitted to "heavy petting" but did not mention sexual penetration. He also deleted their Telegram messages.

The man was later arrested after the school informed the victim's parents, and they reported him to the police.

Exploited opportunities: Judge

High Court Judge Kwek Mean Luck agreed with the prosecution that the man's offences were premeditated.

Pointing out that he took steps to convince the girl to "hang out" in a hotel room, the judge said the man caressed the girl.

He then made another five bookings over the next three months for more hotel rooms, ST reported.

Kwek said: "He exploited these opportunities alone with the victim to commit numerous sexual offences against her."

The judge was also of the view that the man entered and left the hotel rooms separately as one of the ways to conceal his offences.

Some athletes, who took part in the Hyrox Beijing event from Sep. 10 to 13, will reportedly be receiving refunds following an incident in which an athlete suffered faecal incontinence during the race and defecated herself.

Photos and videos circulating online showed the Australian athlete, Joanna Wietrzyk, completing exercises despite her legs and garments being visibly stained with faecal matter during the race on Sep. 12.

She subsequently won the women's event of the competition.

According to a report by the New York Times (NYT), Hyrox told competitors in an email that it would issue refunds equivalent to the value of the event ticket to athletes who competed during certain periods on the same day as Wietrzyk.

Refunds for some participants

A screenshot purportedly showing the email sent to participants was posted on the Reddit thread r/hyrox.

In the email, Hyrox said its on-site team had "completed the sanitisation procedures and full turf replacement" following the incident.

The company said it had also conducted a "thorough internal procedural review" and have decided to issue full refunds to two groups of competitors.

The two groups are:

1. Competitors who started their race before 2:40pm on Sep. 12 and were still racing at 2:40pm that day; and
2. Competitors in wave batches starting between 2:40pm and 8:40pm on Sep. 12.

The email also said Hyrox had updated its official rulebook to include an emergency-response protocol for biological-contamination incidents.

The company said the protocol was now in effect globally.

"Moving forward, we are committed to repaying your passion and support for Hyrox with a more seamless and improved race experience," the email read.

According to NYT, Hyrox did not respond to requests for comment.

It was also unclear how many competitors had received refunds or the total amount refunded.

Background

In a statement on Sep. 12, Hyrox China said the affected areas and race lanes were closed following the incident.

The areas were also thoroughly disinfected, and equipment affected by the incident was also removed.

Hyrox subsequently released two statements regarding the incident.

In the first statement on Sep. 14, the company acknowledged that concerns raised about hygiene were "legitimate" and said it will "examine what happened and take responsibility for continuing to improve".

However, the statement also said Hyrox would ban individuals identified as being responsible for comments that threatened to harm the athlete.

The statement subsequently drew criticism online, as many felt that the statement did not take into account the impact of the incident on other race competitors.

There were also questions about whether different protocols had been applied to elite competitors and other participants.

Hyrox co-founder, Moritz Fürste, issued an apology later the same day.

In a statement posted on Instagram on Sep. 14, Fürste acknowledged that the organiser had made a mistake "by not reacting immediately during the race":

"I apologise to all that were directly or indirectly affected, as well as to everyone who felt like we did not handle the situation like we should have."

Singapore's Defence Minister and Coordinating Minister for Public Services, Chan Chun Sing, spoke at the 13th Xiangshan Forum on Sep. 16 in Beijing, China.

The Xiangshan Forum is a defence and security forum hosted by the China Association for Military Science and the China Institute for International Strategic Studies.

It bills itself as a track 1.5 platform for Asia-Pacific security dialogue, meaning that it draws its participation from official government personnel as well as non-official representatives from academia or think tanks.

Chan spoke about the period of great change that the world was currently undergoing, but also urged countries to “work together to shape the world we want to see”, saying that Singapore welcomed China's aspiration to be a “responsible major country.”

Evolving distribution of power

Chan said that the world was in flux both technologically and economically, and this was shaping and reshaping perceptions of relative power.

The trends that were concerning all nations at present exerted pressures on countries to preserve and advance their own national power at the expense of others.

Chan said that the world's shared challenge was how to enhance a country's own security without being perceived to be threatening the security of others, or without aggravating the insecurity of others.

Three principles to navigate uncertain times

Chan shared three principles that he considered worth bearing in mind as the world navigated uncertain times.

The first was that domestic stability and external security were mutually reinforcing, and that confidence at home enabled a country to cooperate with partners abroad as well as to act in “enlightened long-term interests” internationally.

The second principle was that interdependence bred stability, allowing disparate countries to expand the pool of common interest and create an incentive to cooperate or at least compete within an agreed set of rules.

“Competition and rivalry, if well managed, can spur all of us to do better.”

Chan's third principle was to "first do no harm."

"In order to build trust, it was important to first not break it."

He said that trust was vital but brittle, built by consistency but lost in a single instant.

With trust, difficult issues can be resolved quietly, but without trust, small misunderstandings can simmer and become major problems.

This was true in physical domains like air and sea, but even more so in invisible domains like cyberspace, where intentions were unclear and attribution was not simple.

The power of example

Overcoming the modern security dilemma required rethinking what winning meant, from outgunning or outlasting a rival to winning over the world through “the power of our example” rather than “the example of our power.”

To achieve this, he said he would offer three practical suggestions.

Altering perceptions

The first was that countries needed to be conscious of how shifts in relative power altered perceptions.

Small countries were naturally insecure and needed more assurance, and thus, great powers shouldered high expectations and responsibilities.

A country growing in strength may assert itself to address long-standing grievances and interests, but that growth could look different to those around it.

Chan quoted in Chinese: "When major powers shoulder greater responsibility, smaller countries have less cause for concern."

And therefore, it was necessary for countries to ask themselves: "How do we see ourselves, and how do others see us?"

Strategic patience

Secondly, Chan advised building trust through strategic patience, which he said was the wisdom to choose the course of action that best served long-term interests despite immediate pressures.

“Not every capability needs to be advertised. Not every advantage needs to be immediately pressed, and not every provocation demands an immediate response.”

Creating value together

Thirdly, Chan said that countries must continuously find concrete ways to create value together.

The object of diplomacy, he said, was not to deny each country's own national interests, but to find where it overlapped with others and build real cooperation within that shared space.

He used the example of Singapore's relationship with China, where Singapore supported China's reform and opening up, advocating for its entry into the predecessor to the World Trade Organisation, the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, as far back as the 1980s.

“Hence, despite our differences in perspectives and ideology, history, geography, or even the size of our populations, our leaders found common ground to cooperate for mutual benefit.

“The pragmatic approach continues to guide Singapore today.”

Responsible major country

Chan concluded by admitting that periods of great change can be daunting, as they force countries to adapt.

But it was at these moments that countries could and must work together to shape the world that they wanted to see.

He welcomed China's aspiration to be a "responsible major country", and he credited China's reform and opening up for transforming the lives of China's people and contributing greatly to the prosperity of the region and the world.

A 67-year-old Singaporean woman was hit by a bus and trapped under it while holidaying with her family in Taiwan on Sep. 16.

According to Focus Taiwan, she was using a crosswalk on a road in Taichung when the accident happened.

Images on social media showed a woman lying face down underneath the bus and adjacent to its front left tire.

Emergency personnel tended to her.

Local authorities said she was seriously injured in the accident, suffering a pelvic fracture, open fractures to her right upper arm and left lower limb, and was in a state of cardiac arrest.

Her vital signs were restored while en route to China Medical University Hospital, where she remains under treatment.

LTN reported that the woman was in Taiwan with her family of nine, including her daughter, son-in-law, and granddaughter.

The 45-year-old bus driver has tested negative for alcohol and drugs.

He was reportedly behind the wheel for just over five hours that day.

According to The Straits Times,  the driver claimed to have done all the necessary checks before making the turn.

He apparently only realised he had hit the woman after he heard screams from people around.

A witness told local media that the bus had been moving very slowly.

With his country battling its most intense wildfires in over a decade, Indonesia's forestry ​minister Raja Juli Antoni warned that the blazes could continue until early November 2026.

According to Reuters, this is due to the likely late arrival of the rainy season.

Efforts to contain seasonal fire outbreaks have been complicated by El Niño-linked dry weather.

Borneo and Sumatra, in particular, have felt the brunt of the conditions with fires raging on both islands over the past weeks.

Raja Juli also urged "individuals, farmers, and corporations alike to refrain from using fire during this very strong El Niño period".

Transboundary haze

Fires in Indonesia are behind the transboundary haze experienced in Singapore and Malaysia.

On Sep. 16, the National Environment Agency updated its haze outlook, writing that many air quality stations in Peninsular Malaysia, Sumatra, West Kalimantan, and Central Kalimantan are reporting unhealthy to hazardous levels.

At the time of writing, Singapore's 24-hour air quality forecast was stated as "moderate" to "low unhealthy".

Malaysia's deputy prime minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi, who will be in Jakarta from Sep. 17 to 20, said he would officially raise the transboundary haze issue.

"Diplomatic measures must be pursued alongside technical efforts involving officials from neighbouring countries and Malaysian states," he said, according to Reuters.