Hero Commuters Move 32-Ton Train Off Woman in Amazing Rescue (VIDEO)

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by Adriana Velez 3 hours ago

Here's some more happy news that will restore your faith in humanity. Yesterday morning a woman fell in the gap between a train and the platform at a Tokyo-area train station. She was trapped. That's not the happy part -- I'm getting to that. In response, about 40 commuters pushed the 32-ton train, tilting it so they could help the trapped woman out of the tracks. Amazingly, she survived with just minor injuries. And eight minutes later, the train was running again.

Everyone cheered after the woman was rescued.

Don't you love that? I like to believe people would do the same thing in New York City, though I know if that happened, it would be at least 45 minutes before the train was running again. But still, it's great to see how people are willing to go out of their way to help someone in danger.

I think it would have been easy for any of us to see the woman fall and then kind of back up and look for someone else to help. Maybe you would try to find a conductor or a train employee to do something. But instead, people thought to push the train out of the way. They actually thought, "Hey, if we all push as hard as we can, we can move this train!" They immediately recognized this situation as something that would require a group effort -- and they knew it was possible if everyone worked together.

I wonder how often we think that way. Would you have enough faith in your fellow humans to believe you could all work together to solve a problem? Or would you watch this woman fall and think, "Well, there's nothing I can do." I wonder how many other problems we encounter that look too big for one person to solve alone pass us by just because it never occurred to us to organize a group effort.

If you had been there, would it have occurred to you to get everyone to push the train out of the way?

Image via CNN

ABOUT THE AUTHOR Adriana Velez

is a staff writer who dabbles in food, parenting, news, entertainment, molecular biology, and anything else that that pops into her head. She lives with her elementary school-aged son in Brooklyn, land of urban farms and artisan everything.  

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