Suicide try disrupts MRT run

In front of a group of unsuspecting passengers, a woman tried to commit suicide on Thursday by jumping onto the tracks of the Metro Rail Transit (MRT) as a train approached the Shaw Boulevard station.

However, Rica Fernandez, a 28-year-old resident of Valenzuela City, survived the jump although her left leg, which was pinned beneath the train, had to be amputated.

She was rushed to the nearby VRP Medical Center in Mandaluyong City where she received treatment.

The suicide attempt happened at 11:15 a.m. on the southbound side of the Shaw Boulevard station, disrupting the operations of Metro Manila’s busiest train line.

For more than an hour, there were no trains plying the MRT’s southbound stations from Boni Avenue to Taft Avenue. Operations finally went back to normal at 12:20 p.m.

More than half a million people ride on the MRT every day. It runs on Edsa Metro Manila’s main thoroughfare—from North Avenue in Quezon City to Taft Avenue in Pasay.

Officials of the Department of Transportation and Communications, meanwhile, refused to comment on the incident.

In August, a woman killed herself by jumping onto the tracks of the Light Rail Transit Line 1, another of Metro Manila’s overhead light train systems.

The 52-year-old victim, a resident of Maricaban, Pasay City, was killed on the spot at the Edsa station after her head was crushed beneath the train wheels. The suicide was captured by one of the closed circuit television cameras installed at the station.

The woman was later identified as Lucy Aroma. Her siblings told the police that she had been diagnosed with a tumor in the face, a condition that left her depressed.

Although her death was ruled a suicide, the train driver, Anthony Atutubo, was still charged with reckless imprudence resulting in homicide at the Pasay City Prosecutor’s Office. However, the case was later dropped due to lack of evidence.

 First posted 1:57 pm | Thursday, January 3rd, 2013