The number of casualties from this incident was low because the crash occurred early in
the morning. An hour later, the two trains would have been packed to capacity with rush hour
commuters on their way to work in Manhattan. There were only about 200 passengers on the
two trains at 0612 hours. At capacity, there could have been more than 4,000 passengers on
board. It is fortunate that the crash occurred when it did.
The efforts of the responders to this difficult situation deserve commendation. All the
passengers who presented any complaint of neck or back pain were evacuated from a dangerous
location utilizing proper spinal precautions. Only two responders received even minor injuries.
The incident was concluded and subway and vehicular traffic was restored to a critical
transportation artery by mid-afternoon.
Patient Accountability and Transportation
Given prior experience with incidents involving large numbers of patients and public
transportation, the responders knew they had to deal with two patient accountability concerns.
Ensuring that no single hospital bore a disproportionate load of patients was a primary concern. This would have been even more
important had there been more patients requiring high-level trauma services. As it turned out,
most of those transported by NYC-EMS ultimately were treated and released from the hospital.
It was also important for legal reasons to document who was taken off the trains,
including whether the person was complaining of any injuries at the time of evacuation. This is a
critical task, not only for tracking which patient went to which hospital (for the purposes of
reuniting family members and for follow-up investigations), but also for establishing who was
actually on the train (or bus).
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