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[fineleg]

VIDEO (report and animated enactment)
http://video.msn.com/v/us/msnbc.htm?g=E5AF1714-37A6-4E04-A546-B0FCD1AA36DC&f=00&fg=copy

Hero saves teen who fell on NYC subway tracks
Man leaps, pushes teen into trough, allowing train to pass over them

Wesley Autrey faced a harrowing choice as he tried to rescue a teenager who fell off a platform onto a subway track in front of an approaching train: Struggle to hoist him back up to the platform in time, or take a chance on finding safety under the train.

At first, he tried to pull the young man up, but he was afraid he wouldn’t make it in time and they would both be killed.

“So I just chose to dive on top of him and pin him down,” he said.

Autrey and the teen landed in the drainage trough between the rails Tuesday as a southbound No. 1 train entered the 137th Street/City College station.

The train’s operator saw them on the tracks and applied the emergency brakes.

Two cars passed over the men — with about 2 inches to spare, Autrey said. The troughs are typically about 12 inches deep but can be as shallow as 8 or as deep as 24, New York City Transit officials said.

Relatives identified the teen as Cameron Hollopeter of Littleton, Mass., a student at the New York Film Academy.

Police cited Hollopeter's age to the Associated Press as 19; other news sources gave conflicting numbers.

Hollopeter’s stepmother, Rachel Hollopeter, said Autrey was “an angel.”

“He was so heroic,” she said early Wednesday in a telephone interview. “If he wasn’t there, this would be a whole different call.”

Authorities said Hollopeter had suffered a medical problem, but was in stable condition at a hospital.

Autrey, 50, of Manhattan, declined medical attention.

[fineleg]

http://lonestartimes.com/2007/01/03/wesley-autrey-is-the-man/

Who the Man?

Wesley Autrey the Man:

A hero construction worker left his two young daughters on a Harlem subway platform and leaped into the path of an oncoming train yesterday to rescue a stranger who had fallen on the tracks.

“Tell my little girls that Daddy is OK!” Wesley Autrey shouted from under the No. 1 train after it screeched to a halt. It was just inches above him and the film student he pushed into the trough between the tracks.

Amazingly, neither Autrey nor the man he saved, 20-year-old Cameron Hollopeter, was seriously injured, even though the train grazed the construction worker’s wool cap.

As Autrey was going through the turnstile, he saw Hollopeter having a seizure…Autrey and two women ran to his aid… Hollopeter stumbled and fell onto the tracks as the southbound train rumbled in.

“He landed between the tracks,” Autrey said. “Do I let the train run over this guy? I saw the ladies had my two daughters, so I hopped over on the tracks.

“I saw these two lights coming toward us and I tried to get him up, but he was fighting me.

Hollopeter “was kicking his arms and legs,” Autrey said. “I didn’t want his arms and legs cut off. I knew the train was going to go over us, so I took him, I grabbed him and we fell down.

“I wrapped my arms and legs around him and tightened up. I had to lock my whole body.”

He maneuvered himself and Hollopeter into the trough between the tracks, where “we maybe had one or two inches.”

Autrey said that all he remembered is the sound of the screeching brakes replaced with the screams of his two daughters.

“I’m OK,” Autrey shouted from underneath the train.

No Mr. Autrey–you’re more than just “OK.”

You’re a REAL American Hero.

[avinashgodkhindi]

Amazing find finey, applause

[Shukla]

wow...what a man.

[RicePlateReddy]

Applause for a nice article. Cool animation.

P.S. You know you are a cricket addict when you hear of such news on a cricket forum first!

[fineleg]

Thanks KoP and Avinash.