Results tagged “injured”

A firefighter is in critical condition after a violent altercation erupted inside the Whitehall Terminal on his way to Staten Island early Monday morning. Matthew Dugan, 34, who is assigned to Ladder 15 near the South Street Seaport, had to undergo emergency surgery to relieve swelling on the brain caused by the fight, which started around 1:30 a.m. as he entered the terminal with his girlfriend after drinking at a lower Manhattan bar. Witnesses tell police the fight started when three people laughed at Dugan's girlfriend after she tripped. One bystander tells the Post, "When they laughed, he told them to grow up. They said, ‘Shut the f—k up before we beat you up.’" The situation quickly escalated, and the assailants, described only as two men and one woman, began hitting him in the head and punching him in the face. Dugan, who was off-duty, didn't lose consciousness, but was bleeding heavily from his face and mouth when the ambulance arrived. One of his fellow firefighters tells the Daily News, "We're hoping he's going to be okay." And investigators are reviewing surveillance video showing suspects running from the terminal after the brawl.

Earlier today there was a report over the newswire about a "vicious hawk at the library" of Fordham University. The blog Fordham Notes has an update clarifying things, reporting that there was an injured red-tailed hawk and the vicious hawk was actually the injured bird's mate! The NYPD was called to the Rose Hill campus and has now taken the hawk to the vet. "We are still awaiting word on its condition, but we understand that officers had to wear protective gear to shield themselves from the bird's mate, which was not allowing anyone to get close to its injured counterpart."

An Israeli Army major, on vacation in New York with her family, was injured in the head when a giant rock smashed the windshield of the cab she was riding in on the FDR Tuesday night. The rock, allegedly dropped by two teens from an overpass near 71st Street, sent shards of glass into Gilat Raz's face above her left eye. Her 11-year-old daughter, Raz's sister and nephew were in the back and were unharmed. Raz, 41, tells the Daily News, "I've been driving in the West Bank, I've been in Gaza. I never imagined that New York would be where I'd get hit by a rock. It was scary how much I bled. The children were hysterical."

In defending the city against a lawsuit brought by the family of a San Francisco musician who died after riding the Cyclone last year, a city attorney is insisting that the roller coaster's potentially fatal dangers are "obvious." While riding the Cyclone on his birthday in July 2007, 53-year-old Keith Shirasawa fractured three neck vertebrae and died four days later after complications from surgery. In the lawsuit, his family contends that the Parks Department is at fault for not regularly inspecting the landmark ride. But city attorney Cynthia Goldman argues that "any and all risks, hazards, defects and dangers to the extent alleged are of an open, obvious, apparent and inherent nature known and should have been known to [Shirasawa]," according to court papers obtained by the Daily News. Shirasawa family attorneys blame the injury on a malfunction that made the Cyclone drop too fast, and an "antiquated" single position lap bar.

On July 31st, 2007, 53-year-old Keith Shirasawa celebrated his birthday by riding the Coney Island Cyclone. Five days later he was dead. The San Fransisco musician fractured three neck vertebrae during the Cyclone's first 85-foot drop and later died after complications from surgery. His family has now filed a lawsuit against the city, arguing that the Parks Department is at fault for not inspecting the Landmark ride regularly. (The Parks Department contracts a private company to inspect and repair the ride; the contractor is also named as a defendant.) Lawyers for the Cyclone say the accident was caused by a malfunction that made the Cyclone drop too fast, and that's been fixed. In 2007 at least seven people were injured on the 81-year-old wooden roller coaster.

A 22-year-old woman was hospitalized last night with a head injury after falling six floors in an apartment building elevator, NY1 reports. After visiting her neighbor on the sixth floor of 90 Pinehurst Street in Washington Heights, Jessica Carter entered an elevator which malfunctioned and crashed to the basement. No details yet on the extent of her injuries, but she was admitted to St. Luke's Hospital around midnight with head injuries. And residents in the building are outraged because a few months ago the elevator fell from the first floor to the basement, hospitalizing one resident. The building's superintendent denies any prior problems with the elevator, but the Department of Buildings is investigating. And we'll be taking the stairs today.

Last summer was a rough one for some riders of the 81-year-old Coney Island Cyclone; the Post reports that at least seven people were injured throughout the season while riding the roller coaster. According to Astroland operator Carole Albert’s website, the ride “has the highest safety standards in the outdoor amusement industry,” and in order to maintain that perception, Albert’s been trying to quietly settle the ensuing lawsuits out of court.

Katalin Pota (pictured), the actress who played Tony Soprano's housekeeper Lilliana, has been ousted from her Williamsburg loft on Grand Avenue. The building she lived in is owned by Simon Taub, the man who built a wall in the middle of his Borough Park mansion to separate himself from his wife.

"The skin was peeled off her toe; it's a pretty horrifying injury,” says the lawyer representing the family of a 3-year-old girl in a $7 million lawsuit against the Colorado-based footwear company Crocs. The girl, Emma Hochberg of Westchester, was wearing pink clogs when she got caught in an escalator at JFK Airport, chewing up her big toe and causing “severe and permanent” injuries.