It was 3:14 a.m. on Sunday, September 13, at Spring Street station in Manhattan.
Malaika Chitre and Navam Kaul, both 24 years old, recent university graduates just starting their careers, were sitting on the New York subway tracks. The train operator on the 4 line said she saw them there, motionless, and that Chitre was laughing while pulling Kaul toward her. The train did not have time to stop.
The Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s initial account stated that one fell onto the tracks and the other climbed down to help him. But the videos that circulated afterward show something different: the two sitting calmly, with no signs of an accident, seconds before the impact.
Nearly 100 passengers were evacuated from the train car after the collision. New York police are investigating whether substance use or a mental health episode was behind the scene, but so far there is no official cause. Only footage from one camera and the memory of a train operator who was never able to stop the train in time. Both were pronounced dead at the scene.