Following the now infamous April 12 incident in which an elderly woman was dragged down a platform and then fell into the tracks after a new train door clamped on her hand and wouldn't let go, a fresh incident occurred with a woman getting her hand stuck in an older train car's door, but from the inside.
This incident happened Tuesday morning on an outbound N-Judah train, and the woman, who was trying to exit the train and apparently got to the door just as it was closing, got her hand trapped in the door, which would not reopen as it was supposed to. The driver evidently heard what was happening, and stopped the train after driving about a block, as NBC Bay Area reports.
Muni inspectors proceeded to inspect the door in question and found a small crack in the pressurized rubber tubing that is supposed to act as a sensor, triggering the door to reopen when an object is blocking it. As of Thursday, as a precaution, inspections were ordered on 60 of the old Breda train cars, many of which have been in continual use for 20 years.
And that's not all! NBC Bay Area also discovered another incident that has not been reported on in which a Breda train door spontaneously opened on a crowded train while it was in motion. That incident happened on May 17, and the door was apparently triggered by a passenger hitting the door-opening bar, which is not supposed to be functional when a train is in motion. The opening of the door, however, triggered the train's emergency braking system. The incident was reported by Muni officials in a briefing paper submitted to the agency's board on Thursday.
Muni engineers found the cause to be a loose wire, and they were able to recreate the issue. But, they say, this particular failure scenario had never occurred before.
Luckily no one was hurt!
The same can't be said for Sunset resident Choi Ngor Li, who last week filed suit against the city after that April train-dragging left her with broken ribs, a collapsed lung, and fractured pelvis and spine.