Fatal car accident involving NTU exchange student in Slovakia

A Nanyang Technological University (NTU) student died in Slovakia last Friday (25 Nov), NTU said in a statement released on Tuesday.

Justin Tan Honng Tze (23) was driving a rented car during a storm in Slovakia that day when a tree fell on his car and hit him on the head. He was found unconscious by rescuers and brought to a local hospital but did not awakened.

Doctors certified him brain-dead and he died in hospital on Friday.

His parents and brother, accompanied by the NTU’s associate chair Professor Ooi Kim Tiow, flew to Slovakia on Friday.

His parents were asked and agreed to donate his organs to other patients in Slovakia. NTU informed that his body was cremated there and his family returned to Singapore with his ashes.

President of NTU, Professor Bertil Andersson, said Justin was a good student with an outgoing personality and a kind heart; the university is saddened by his death.

“Our NTU colleagues have been doing all we can to support and assist his family. He will be dearly missed by all who know him, and our professional counselors from NTU will assist his fellow students in coping with the emotional impact of this tragedy,” Professor Andersson said.

Justin had been a third-year mechanical engineering undergraduate, who was on an exchange program in the Czech Republic at the VSB -Technical University Ostrava.

He was also a former national athlete, who in World Youth Championship 2012 Singapore was placed number 28 and had a score of 13.38 in qualification.

Justin was also an avid climber who loved to take on challenges and adventures, and he had represented Singapore in climbing sport at the 2011 SEA Games, Prof Andersson wrote in an email to the NTU students.

ESN VŠB-TU Ostrava, the student association helping foreign students at the Technical University Ostrava posted their condolence on its Facebook:

“ESN VŠB – TU Ostrava is deeply saddened to inform about the untimely passing of Justin Tan Honng Tze, student of Nanyang Technological University Singapore, who studied as an exchange student at the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering at VŠB – Technical University of Ostrava.”

“He passed away after a tragic accident in Slovakia on 25th November, 2016.”

“We would like to express our deepest condolences to the family and friends of Justin on their loss,” it wrote.