Pedestrian Passed Out on Railroad Tracks [Update]

A Long Beach-bound train was halted and suspended on the Long Island Rail Road bridge spanning Reynolds Channel after a pedestrian passed out on the train tracks in the city Wednesday evening.  

At about 10:50 p.m., fire officials cut the power to the third rail after they learned that a male subject had fallen on the tracks about 50 feet north of the platforms at the Long Beach train station, according to Rich Corbett, chief of the Long Beach Fire Department.  

“What we had to do was a lift operation,” Corbett said Wednesday following the incident. “Before we entered the tracks, we made sure the power was shut off and our members entered the track area. We did a quick medical assessment, secured him to what’s called a Stokes basket, and lifted him off the tracks.”

The fire chief did not immediately have details about the subject’s age and his possible injuries on Wednesday. Majorie Anders, an MTA spokeswoman, said on Thursday that the subject suffered a head injury and was transported in an ambulance to South Nassau Communities Hospital in Oceanside. The MTA police investigated the incident, but since no criminal charges were filed against the pedestrian, the case is strictly a medical call and thus not public information, Anders said.

Corbett said that standby units had just been released after firefighters extinguished a car fire on Shore Road earlier Wednesday evening when Long Beach firefighters were placed back into service for the incident near the train station.

LIRR commuters who called Patch while stuck on the first car of the train for about 15 minutes said the train was headed over the bridge between Island Park and Long Beach when, at about 10:50 p.m., it suddenly stopped.

“The conductor made an announcement right away,” said Mark Bollacchio, who was coming home from work in Brooklyn. “He was very informative.”

Sam Kinsley, who was returning from Manhattan after work, said that the lights and air conditioning on their car kept working and the conductors kept commuters informed.

“They told us there was an unconscious man on the tracks in Long Beach and they cut the power,” Kinsely said.  

Michelle Reinbach, another commuter who was coming from work in Manhattan, said the train started to move back to the Long Beach train station at about 11:05 p.m., but that they may have ended up back at the Island Park station.  

“The train conductor actually did say that officials were deciding whether they might push us back to Island Park depending on how long it took to get the person off the track,” Reinbach said.

* Editor's note: This story was updated from the original version.