Man survives after leaping off platform into path of oncoming train in China

BEIJING — An elderly Chinese man miraculously survived after he put himself in the path of an oncoming train in a station in northeastern China on Sunday (April 2), Chinese media reported.

The man, who is in his 70 or 80s, was seen on security footage leaping off the platform at the Jinmalu light-rail train station in Dalian, Liaoning province, seconds before a train arrived, the Peninsula Morning Post reported.

The train ran over him, but he survived as he had fallen in between the tracks and avoided getting hit, the report said.

The train stopped at the station after the incident, and the man was pulled to safety by firefighters who arrived soon after.

“The man felt unwell before he jumped from the platform,” said Mr Sun Jiaqi, a firefighter at the scene, told the newspaper.

The man was found to be in a stable condition and the light-rail train service resumed operations after the disruption. An investigation is underway.

Another man who leapt onto train tracks last month was not as lucky.

That man, in his 30s, had tried to run across the tracks at the Nanjing South Railway Station in Nanjing, eastern Jiangsu province, on March 26. He failed to cross the tracks in time, however, and was crushed to death by an oncoming bullet train.

His body was wedged between the train and the platform as he tried to hoist himself up onto the platform.

Witnesses said he remained conscious after getting pinned between the train and the platform and tried to free himself even as rescuers rushed to the scene.

But he soon lost consciousness and was pronounced dead at the scene.

Rescue workers had to break apart the concrete platform to extract his body. It was unclear why he was trying to cross the tracks. SOUTH CHINA MORNING POST