Three heroes have been lauded after they risked their lives to try and save a woman stuck upside down in her mobility scooter on Tube tracks.
Footage shows the moment the brave men jumped between the live rails at King's Cross at around 1:45pm on Saturday, April 29. The men tried to lift the woman to safety, after her blue mobility scooter veered off the platform just as a train was due to arrive at the station, reports My London.
One bystander, Omar, 25, described how the train was set to arrive within minutes so someone triggered an alarm to halt the oncoming train and prompt the evacuation of the busy station. Transport for London staff and British Transport Police officers then raced onto the Northbound platform to take the woman to safety.
BTP say the woman was then rushed to hospital, and her injuries are believed to be "potentially life-changing". Omar said: "I was on the platform and there was a disabled woman on her mobility scooter with her daughter who looked around 18 or 19.
"Everyone was waiting for the train. I did not see the moment she went in but I heard scream and looked to my left and saw her falling onto the tracks. Her daughter let out a blood curdling scream like 'Mum'. Everyone started screaming at this point."
Immediately after the incident, Omar watched as the heroes launched themselves onto the tracks, despite the arrivals displaying a warning that a train was due in minutes.
The injured woman landed upside down and was seemingly lodged between the pit and the rails, and Omar says bystanders began shouting to move her foot so it wouldn't be crushed by the oncoming carriages.
"Everyone was screaming just put her foot down, so when the train comes she would be fully beneath," Omar said.
"The daughter was screaming 'That's my mum' and a woman was trying to tell her to take deep breaths. One guy even went back in to trying to move her to get her out. But they couldn't get her out and everyone was saying 'the train is coming'."
Omar says one of the heroes was "zapped" by an electrified rail and dragged himself to safety before laying on the platform. Once the panic alarm had been pressed, Omar says an announcement boomed over the platform telling everyone to evacuate as transport workers and BTP officers ran in with the train seemingly halted in the tunnel.
Omar said he was "in shock" as he checked on the men, finding one was covered in the woman's blood. He said: "One guy got zapped and was not speaking much. The other guy with a Northern accent, he was just going 'F**k, f**k, there was no way to get her out'. I said 'There's nothing more you could have done'.
"He said 'Mate, her hair and her blood was all sticking to my feet'. I could literally see it on his shoes. Blood and hair. He said 'I'm alright, I'll be fine. But her daughter'.
We said 'You were so brave'. He could not really talk though he was in pieces." Omar said he stayed on the platform to keep a look out for the oncoming train entering the tunnel, but luckily it never arrived.
"I think they managed to stop it because the alarm was pressed," he said.
"But the platform did not say it was not coming. We were all on the edge of our seats until BTP came running in."
He also said there wasn't enough time to get the woman out without hurting her more. "I do not think there was a clear way to pull her and grab her out," he said. "Getting her out without causing further damage was a tall order in that time frame."
Omar says he had a panic attack and left the station "looking like a madman". He continued: "I have just been reliving it in my head. It was the reaction of the daughter that made it real."
A BTP spokesperson said: "Colleagues from London Fire Brigade and London Ambulance Service also attended, and a person has been taken to hospital with what are believed to be potentially life-changing injuries.
"The circumstances of the incident have been investigated which is not being treated as suspicious."
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