Bystander rescues blind man who fell onto TTC subway tracks

A TTC rider is being hailed as a good Samaritan, after risking his own life to save someone else.

Julie Caniglia says on Thursday afternoon she was riding on the subway when her car pulled up at Broadview Station and she heard someone calling out for help.

The faint voice, which kept saying “help, help me please”, wasn’t coming from anyone in the car.

After hearing it again, Caniglia says she stood up and looked out on the platform an saw that a man with a walking cane was lying on the tracks below.

Caniglia says he was blind and appeared to have injured himself.

Without hesitation, a man sitting near her jumped from the subway car and onto the tracks, risking his own life as he could easily have been electrocuted by the third rail or struck by an oncoming subway car.

The bystander was able to get to the fallen man and pull him to safety.

“Thankfully two other men showed up to help as well and this story has a happy ending,” recounted Caniglia.

“These men need to be recognized as good Samaritan’s. If they hadn’t reacted so quickly, the outcome would have been horrific.”

Caniglia shared a photo of the incident on Facebook, which shows three men standing overtop of another man with a walking cane by his side.

At the time of writing this article, Caniglia’s post has been shared over 19,000 times on Facebook and people from across the city are praising these men for their efforts, calling them “heroes” and “outstanding men”.

Earlier this month the TTC announced it has an engineering study underway to install subway barriers. TTC spokesperson Brad Ross told Daily Hive the estimated cost would be a minimum of $1 billion.

Ross also told Daily Hive the study will be completed in 2020, but there are no estimated dates as to when barriers would be installed – the study will inform that.

The barriers would be automatically controlled and act as a barrier to the tracks, allowing access only when a train arrives and stops at the station, preventing people from jumping or falling onto the tracks.

With files from Yasmin Aboelsaud

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