KEY POINTS

  • NYPD officers Christopher Cerny and Gary Lamour are being hailed as heroes 
  • The man in his 30s suffered a seizure on the tracks
  • The NYPD released the bodycam footage of the incident on Twitter

The timely intervention of two NYPD personnel saved a man who collapsed onto subway tracks as a train approached the station.

Police said NYPD officers Christopher Cerny and Gary Lamour rescued a man they saw having a medical episode and then falling onto subway tracks at the 14th Street and Eight Avenue station in lower Manhattan. The incident happened around 2 p.m. Saturday when the officers were on patrol duty.

The bodycam footage posted by the department on Twitter Sunday shows one of the officers signaling the driver of the Northbound A train, which was heading towards the station, to stop while the other officer jumping to the tracks to revive the man. The NYPD officials added that the officers used hand and light signals to alert the train operator.

One of the officers is shown grabbing him by his arm, lifting the still-unconscious man and carrying him to the platform. The man, who is said to be in his 30s and not been publicly identified, was later taken by emergency medical service to Bellevue Hospital.

No one was injured in the incident and the train service was also not disrupted.

Transit Chief Kathleen O’Reilly praised the men's action on Twitter Monday.

"A glimpse of how Transit cops saved a man in medical distress yesterday," the tweet said.

“This life-saving rescue would not have been possible without our officers’ quick actions & the alertness of the @NYCTSubway train operator,” her tweet read.

Police Commissioner Dermot Shea said that the officers' actions "may have just saved his life."

This comes as a welcome relief as the city is battling a spike in subway crime. Mayor Bill de Blasio announced Monday that another 250 additional police officers would be deployed to the subways in a bid to curb crime. This will bring the number of officers on transit patrol to 3,250.

In a similar incident, an Indian Railway worker had turned a hero and saved a child who fell onto the tracks from being run over. Pointsman Mayur Shelkhe had risked his life to save the child seconds before the train rushed past. The video of the incident had then gone viral.

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Representation. Pixabay