SINGAPORE - The plans of many were snuffed out by incessant rain that began early on Jan 10 and continued well into Jan 11.

At the Aloha Sea Sports Centre in East Coast Park, where water-sport lovers go to stand-up paddle and windsurf, weekends are usually the busiest, but the constant showers led to 10 cancellations for bookings on both Jan 11 and 12, said general manager Loh Fock Jin.

He said on Jan 11: “We’ve had totally zero business.

“It’s a very unusual season, the north-east monsoon should be entering a dry spell around this time and we should be getting strong trade winds.

“Things are getting unpredictable.”

The unseasonably wet weather is the product of a monsoon surge - a sudden increase in wind speeds that causes cold air to rush southwards in the South China Sea.

National water agency PUB had on Jan 9 warned of flash floods between Jan 10 and Jan 13 due to this weather phenomenon, with the National Environment Agency separately saying that temperatures could dip to 22 deg C in some places.

Outdoor activities have naturally been the hardest hit, with at least two golfing events on Jan 11 - one at the Changi Golf Club and one at the Singapore Island Country Club - also disrupted, according to online notices.

Four Singapore Rugby Union National League matches on the same day were axed, and another two moved to a different field.

A beach clean-up at Pulau Ubin, organised by Drama Box for Jan 11, was also nixed.

The downpour also resulted in the temporary closure of lifts in a Serangoon Housing Board block on Jan 11 due to “water ingress”, the Ang Mo Kio Town Council said in a Facebook post on the same day.

On Jan 10, residents of Block 454 Chua Chu Kang Avenue 4 had to make do with just one working lift, after two lifts were declared out of service due to water seepage caused by the heavy rain.

Woe to businesses, too, like seafood reseller Lian Huat Seafood, which lamented delays to some of its deliveries in a Facebook post on Jan 10.