An Irish woman had a miracle escape in New York after she fell onto tracks in a subway station - with three trains passing just feet from her.
Mary Downey, broke her shoulder after she fell onto the tracks at 49th Street Station, located at the north end of Times Square, but was lucky to escape with her life.
The 22-year-old, who was conscious the whole time, is believed to have manoeuvred herself into a small gap between the train tracks and the station platform, with three trains passing by before she was seen by the driver of the last.
The driver hit the brakes and paramedics pulled Downey from under the train and took her to Bellevue hospital.
Downey was taken to hospital but was released and is now recovering at her home in the Bronx area of New York.
Video posted on YouTube shows Downey being carried out of the subway station on a stretcher - with soot marks clearly visible on her arms.
In the footage she is surrounded by a dozen firemen who lift her up the stairs and wheel her over to a waiting ambulance which takes her away.
Downey is held down by five straps that cross her body and a double strap holding her head in place.
Her arms - which have soot marks on them - are by her sides and she is not moving, with her legs splayed out at the bottom of the stretcher.
The dramatic incident happened at 6am on Sunday as she made her way home after a night out.
Downey walked into the 49th Street station to get a subway train but toppled over and fell onto the tracks, breaking her shoulder as a northbound train on the N line was approaching.
A spokesman for the NYPD said that Downey survived by crawling into the tiny space under the platform and getting into the foetal position.
She did not lie between the middle of the two tracks, as had been speculated.
The first subway driver did not realise he had driven over her, and neither did the second.
It was only the third subway train driver who realised something was wrong, but initially thought it was a piece of rubbish on the track.
The spokesman said that Downey was saved when the driver of the third train saw her "arms and legs moving around".
A friend who declined to identify themselves said she she was "doing really well and just fractured her shoulder".
FDNY Battalion Chief Mike Meyers said: "She was lucky enough to have rolled to the platform and was in between the platform and the train when the train came into the station."
He said: ‘He hit the brakes and stopped just past her. Paramedics and firemen arrived and got her out.
"She is lucky not to have been hit."
A spokeswoman for the New York City Fire Department said that Downey was rescued by one fire engine, a fire truck and a rescue company, which would have been around 20 men in total.
A source told the New York Post: "It just wasn’t her time."
Irish News
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