{"id":361138,"date":"2026-09-30T20:52:10","date_gmt":"2026-09-30T20:52:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/361138\/"},"modified":"2026-09-30T20:52:10","modified_gmt":"2026-09-30T20:52:10","slug":"ntsb-to-investigate-nyc-subway-dragging-death-in-which-passengers-bag-may-have-gotten-snagged","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/361138\/","title":{"rendered":"NTSB to investigate NYC subway dragging death in which passenger’s bag may have gotten snagged"},"content":{"rendered":"

Investigators with the National Transportation Safety Board were due to arrive in Brooklyn Wednesday<\/a> to probe the apparent dragging death of a subway passenger earlier this week. Three investigators were dispatched by the federal agency, NTSB spokesman Keith Holloway told the Daily News.<\/p>\n

As previously reported by The News<\/a>, 57-year-old Yaw Adu Boahene died Monday after he was apparently dragged along the platform at the Utica Ave. subway station in Bedford-Stuyvesant.<\/p>\n

He had just gotten off of a Manhattan-bound A train when witnesses said he was dragged \u2014 possibly by a plastic shopping bag that had gotten caught in the train door.<\/p>\n

Boahene ultimately fell between the train and the platform, and was declared dead at the scene.<\/p>\n

While the NTSB has investigated multiple subway incidents in recent years \u2014 and is currently investigating the death of NYC Transit construction flagger Moet McCullum<\/a>, who was killed on the job in early September \u2014 multiple transit sources said it was unusual for the feds to investigate an incident like Monday\u2019s dragging death.<\/p>\n

The NTSB did not send investigators in 2024 when a man died after his arm got caught in the doors of an out-of-service Q train<\/a> at the Prospect Park station, nor did the feds investigate a fatal 2022 dragging at the Q train\u2019s Avenue M stop<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Asked why the feds had dispatched a team to Bed-Stuy, Holloway said \u201cthe agency has investigated similar dragging injuries and fatalities in the past\u201d \u2014 and pointed to a 2021 investigation of a death in San Francisco\u2019s Bay Area Rapid Transit system, in which a passenger was dragged to his death by his dog\u2019s leash<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cThrough this investigation, the NTSB is seeking to understand what happened, how it happened, and whether there are lessons or safety improvements that could help prevent similar accidents in the future,\u201d Holloway said in a statement.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey have the jurisdiction to cover any incident that they wish,\u201d MTA chairman Janno Lieber said Wednesday when asked about the feds\u2019 arrival. \u201cWe\u2019ll always work with them.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"FILEPolice investigate after a person was fatally struck by a train at the Utica Avenue A\/C subway station in Brooklyn, New York on Tuesday, Jan. 7, 2020. (Gardiner Anderson for New York Daily News)<\/p>\n

The investigation comes amid ongoing tensions between the US Department of Transportation, which has repeatedly threatened to cut federal funding for the transit agency over perceived issues of worker safety, passenger safety, and New York state\u2019s congestion tolling program.<\/p>\n

The NTSB, which operates independently from the USDOT, is largely regarded as nonpartisan.<\/p>\n

NYC Transit president Demetrius Crichlow said Wednesday that much still remained unclear about Boahene\u2019s death.<\/p>\n

Boahene was seen on the train car\u2019s security cameras with a cane and a blue plastic bag, moving unsteadily toward the door after the train stopped at Utica Ave.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have cameras, so we have the ability to see him getting on and off the train,\u201d Crichlow said. \u201cWe don\u2019t have a direct view of that portion of the station from the outside of the cars, so it\u2019s unclear at this point how he came into contact with the train \u2014 did he stumble, did the bag get caught, did the cane get caught, did he step in-between the gap? That, we\u2019re unsure of.\u201d<\/p>\n

The train \u2014 made up of R211 cars, the newest in the subway fleet \u2014 had passed an inspection in July, Crichlow said. An inspection of the train immediately after Boahene was killed revealed no issues with the train doors or the so-called \u201cindication\u201d system meant to prevent trains with obstructed doors from moving.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe conductor has the responsibility of observing the platform \u2014 they observe the platform before they close the doors, and they observe the platform as they\u2019re departing the station,\u201d Crichlow said. \u201cWhether or not that was done is currently under investigation.\u201d<\/p>\n

As previously reported, the train crew was unaware Boahene was being dragged, and the train continued on three stops toward Manhattan before MTA rail control took it out of service.<\/p>\n

An initial incident report reviewed by the Daily News says the conductor told rail control \u201cit was a normal stop. Didn\u2019t see anything unusual, don\u2019t recall anything unusual.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Investigators with the National Transportation Safety Board were due to arrive in Brooklyn Wednesday to probe the apparent…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":361139,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[9,56,63,65,64,88],"class_list":["post-361138","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york-city","tag-new-york","tag-ny","tag-nyc","tag-nyc-headlines","tag-nyc-news","tag-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/361138","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=361138"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/361138\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/361139"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=361138"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=361138"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=361138"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}