Woman Killed By 6 Train Was Retrieving Dropped Bag

Frankly, I don't c are how awful and insensitive this may sound; I know you are thinking this so I may as well say it, and I would expect this to be said about me if I were to be this effing stupid:

How dumb can a person be? Honestly Rosemary Mankof, if you made the decision to jump after a bag that wasn't prada, gucci, LV, vivienne westwood, etc and that didn't at least have your credit cards, or anything important then I'm happy. Honestly, I am. One less idiot in this world. Roll in your grave all you want but you got what you deserved. You voluntarily jumped ONTO the tracks to get a back that had deodorant and a towel inside a bag that was $20 (at best) from Target. What the heck was this moron thinking?

This incident is anything BUT sad. It makes me so angry to know that this person was an American. It is pretty clear to me that we Americans still need common sense. I read somewhere that many NYers are always retrieving something from the tracks, but one man had jumped in because a child was on the tracks. Because that man was A) smart and B) doing it for a GOOD REASON, he laid himself down between the tracks and saved not only the idiot kids life but his own as well.

After all of these years of watching people get crushed by trains to pick up something so stupid that is replaceable, HAVEN'T YOU IDIOTS STOPPED TO THINK FOR A SECOND? "OMG MY PHONE FELL ON THE TRACKS! I need to get that phone! I have all my contacts and important dates on there!!! You know what... I know I can get all that information back... I can hear the train anyways and I KNOW it's faster than I can get out."

THATS THINKING ROSEMARY! Not what you did! Now you have a grieving family that is sitting there wondering how stupid could you possibly be? Apparently, your dumbest mistake was this; and no thanks to you, the termination of your life was the cost; not to mention time spent cleaning up your left overs, taking time away from the transit people, professionals that needed to find alternative transportation, investigators, ME's.... all these people (and more) wasted money because of your one single stupid decision.

If this would have happened somewhere else, such as the UK, I would think "OMG wow that poor woman/man." However, given the "special" circumstances, it, OF COURSE, happened in America. So now I am thinking "OMG wow, you idiots still have not learned from the other thousands of morons trying to get their lipgloss or phone!" If it's a child... fine jump in... if it is your dog... by all means, I understand completely. If it is your bag without a great brand name that has dirty ugly target towels, LEAVE IT ALONE! Just watch it get destroyed, that is a lot more interesting to watch anyway and less expensive on the city and other people.

I know you all hate me for saying this, but like I said, I also know most of you are thinking it. I just say it.

sad.

RIP.

God how terrible.

There is nothing in my bookbag that I would jump on the subway track for. Astonishing.

RIGHT!?!?!?!?!?!? This lady was... lack for a better word... mind numbingly stupid

This story is awful. I sometimes worry about bumping shoulders or tripping while walking along the yellow line.

If you drop something on the tracks, just ask a graffiti writer to retrieve it for ya.. they wander those tunnels more than the MTA.. just don't ask the kid who lost his leg last month, i'm sure he's still recovering.

IMO the argument made by the iPod guy's mom for platform doors makes more and more sense every day.

Rest in peace Rosemary Mankof.

The train's motorman had sounded his horn repeatedly—and also engaged the emergency brake. A passenger aboard the train, Glena Farr, said to the Times, "We felt a horrible thud. It was horrible. I’ve never felt anything like it, that terrible boom." The Post says, "It was chaos on the platform as straphangers shrieked with horror upon seeing the shredded parts of her body."

If that woman were your mother or aunt or sister would YOU want this printed in the paper or on a blog?

Grow the F up, Gothamist.

Listen here Snickerdoodle.....

why don't YOU just stop reading all together, okay? This dumba$$ woman decided to jump on the tracks very clearly hearing the train and seeing it coming towards her. She didn't even have to. If I were the editor, I would post pictures of whatever wouldn't be blurred out.

another thing.... my family AND friends wouldn't but as retarded as this woman was, to jump ONTO the tracks of a subway/train. See..... I was raised in a family where education was important for a career and intellectual stimulating conversations, being street smart was important for knowing when someone was trying to rip you off, and common sense was important so that you know what NOT to do and WHAT TO DO. This fool had possibly only education, and even that didn't help her case. My point.... it would NEVER happen to the people I associate with.

So these "graphic" details are GOOD. A) it keeps the audience locked into the article, I would know I am a writer and B) she deserves as much embarrassment as can be given.

If you can't take reading gory details about death, it's probably best to skip reading articles with headlines beginning with such words as "Woman killed."

Stick with headlines containing "cute," "bunnies," flowers," stuff like that.

Do you like sloppy joe sammiches?

Because word on the street that's what she ended up looking like.

Isn't this always the case? People dropped a bag, a cell phone, an ipod. There's nothing I could drop that would make me jump onto the tracks for it. What's wrong with people?

Agreed. If you jump down there to retrieve something, aren't you--at the very least--guaranteed to ruin your clothes? I hate to blame to poor dead lady, but the equation makes no sense at all. Well, people do stupid things in an instant. Sometimes there is no do-over.

Darwin bags another. Sadly she may have already procreated.

i was trying to get on an uptown 6 at Union when this happened. Total pandemonium: the 6 stopped running so several hundred people tried to climb into the 4/5. Waited for two trains before I could finally get on (why don't those jackasses in the handicapped seats who AREN'T HANDICAPPED don't stand up and give us some damn room), then they constantly blared over the intercom that "due to passenger injury and police investigation, all 6 trains were running express b/w Grand Central and 125th st." At least they kept us in the loop to some degree.

This ain't about you, man.

she did not pay attention to this

http://www.flickr.com/photos/marvelitsky/4426610365/

A gruesome death for a $50 gym bag. People are getting stupider by the day in this city. Didn't some other guy recently get the same result when he went down for an MP3 player? I still find myself moving well away from the edge when a train is approaching. I remember when people were being pushed onto the tracks by crazy people. I look at everyone around me as well. Nearly everyone else has their earplugs in and are completely oblivious.

Amen.

Now that we've had our first subway incident, we can all learn from others' mistakes.

/s

FIRST??? this is one of many! Morons don't give 2 shyts about what has happened to the priors. This idiot woman wanted her towel. She asked for it.

Not one person tried to grab her arm/hand and pull her up?

RIP.

No. You weren't there and clearly the rest of us are selfish and useless assholes.

What's even more incredible are the people trying to blame the train operator for causing this. You see someone on the tracks and let go of the controller (which throws the train into emergency) and blow the horn. What else do they expect them to do? Get out and physically stop the train like Superman?

No, like Spiderman, didn't you see the movie?

RIP lady, you made a bad call........

What happened to this poor woman is terrible, but come on! How could anyone intentionally go on to the tracks like that? It's so incredibly dangerous!

I think the thing is that the height itself is actually pretty shallow, like the platform is 3' 9.5" high so most people think they can pull themselves back up, and indeed, most people can. If you've ever pulled yourself out of a pool at the 4' mark, then you can probably go onto the tracks and pull yourself up. The problem is that that requires upper body strength, and people tend to over estimate their upper body strength. You know exactly how powerful your legs and arms are because you use those every day, but you rarely run into a situation that requires you to lift yourself up. Plus the platforms have a divit between the outer most part of the platform and the wall holding it in place so that the metal bar that touches the 3rd rail can be unobstructed, and you can't really see that from the platform, so she probably though that the platform was just a flat wall and she could use her legs to pull herself up, which apparently she tried to do since she was holding onto the platform with her arms and had her legs against the platform walls, meaning she was trying to go up on an angle less than 90 degrees.

She probably saw people do it all the time, and figured that it wasn't that big of a deal. I think that she probably was at the middle of the platform, since she got struck by the train with the e-brakes off, which would have stopped the train just north of the middle, and at rush hour, you have 6 trains coming in and out of the station constantly, like one every minute. The 6 train has something like 16 cars during rush hour, and from the middle of the platform it would probably take her about a minute to run to the front of the platform where the stairs are. That being said, she probably didn't have enough time to make it to the end of the platform, and thus needed to pull her self up, and in her panicked state was struggling to do so.

Aside from her death, you really have to wonder about how its going to fuck up those kids. They were all trying to help her up, probably saw it when she got hit and had to of had the realization that they witnessed a pretty brutal death.

sweetie.. the guy did use the e-brake. This is evidence that you cannot argue.

Most of what you said is clear and correct, except the below:

and at rush hour, you have 6 trains coming in and out of the station constantly, like one every minute. The 6 train has something like 16 cars during rush hour,

First of all, 6 trains run approx. every 5 minutes, even during rush hour. And *all* subway trains (except the shuttles, the G and maybe the C) are 10 cars long.

"If you've ever pulled yourself out of a pool at the 4' mark, then you can probably go onto the tracks and pull yourself up."

Deceptive test, because of course the buoyancy of your body will make it easier to pull yourself out of a pool (unless you're talking about an empty pool, but not people have had that experience). Someone thinking they could pull themselves up from the tracks because they do it in a 4' pool actually could end up getting killed.

I've done it twice...once for a brand new cell phone and the other for a cd player. Not a big deal if you understand the consequence of taking too long on the tracks and get in & out. If you're prone to panicking, its probably a better bet to ask for help cuz for sure its nerve racking. If you drop it in the middle of the platform, climb down, get your junk...you should def walk away from where the train is arriving. And for goodness sake, be quick. Poor woman had no business on those tracks. So sad.

Yeah, it's pretty ridiculous. Going on the tracks if you're able to get yourself out, or not during rush hour on the freaking 6, would be one thing. It makes me wonder what the hell could have been in that bag.

NOTHING IMPORTANT!!!! She had deodorant towels and probably some soap. THAT IS IT. No license, no SS Card, no billing info, no personal info. NOTHING. All that was on her. I honestly thank god she didn't reproduce. Otherwise we'd have a bunch of little idiots running around all damn day killing themselves or others by accident.

The article said it was just gym clothes and toiletries...nothing of significant value really.

I don't get why so many people get hurt - there's almost always a set of stairs at both ends of every platform, and if worse comes to worse, you know exactly where the train will be stopping (the end of the platform), run that way! Everyone knows the one place there is never clearance is between the platform and the train.

Yes, run away from the train. Also, you don't need to go toward the platform. Couldn't she have just stepped over the third rail onto the other side of the tracks (I know -- easy for me to say)? But you're right that the absolute worst place to be is where she was, clinging to the edge of the platform.

I've seen people do it, but only people who were able to easily climb back up again. And of course, not when a train was approaching.

Sawdust does a pretty good job of soaking up gore. If you've ever seen copious amounts of sawdust on the tracks...

I heard the station was only closed for an hour. Pretty impressive work, MTA!

"We felt a horrible thud. It was horrible. I’ve never felt anything like it, that terrible boom." The Post says, "It was chaos on the platform as straphangers shrieked with horror upon seeing the shredded parts of her body."

How terrible!