Festival Walk slowly recovering from ‘unprecedented torrential rainfall’
While some stores have suffered damage, most of the mall has returned to normal
It's back to normal for Festival Walk, three days after a freak rainstorm barraged the glitzy Kowloon Tong mall.
Sunday's unexpected black rain left the food court and several shops in Festival Walk's north zone drenched in a soaking flood that disabled six of the mall's escalators and cascaded across store floors.
Media reports originally indicated that chunks of hail had crashed through the mall's ceiling, but management confirmed a section of pipe that had burst was the actual culprit.
"The flood was caused by the unprecedented torrential rainfall," said Cindy Chow, CEO of Mapletree Greater China Commercial Trust, owners of Festival Walk. "Tremendous water pressure damaged a pipe, and the pipe burst and water overflowed and flooded parts of the building."
Festival Walk staff mobilised to handle the disaster and evacuate customers, though not before photographs of mall "waterfalls" began to go viral on social media.
Thanks to vacuum water sucking machines that were used overnight, the flood was mopped up in about twelve hours.
Three days after the crisis, there is little sign of flooding in Festival Walk, except for a broken ceiling panel that collapsed under water pressure and a few drying areas that are cordoned off from customers.