Unsuck DC Metro: Scary Red Line Pranks?

Friday, September 2, 2011

Scary Red Line Pranks?

Has anyone else experienced this?

From J:

This incident scared the living daylights out of those of us on board. You could call it a morning heart attack.

It was on the Red Line between Brookland and Rhode Island Ave. heading toward Shady Grove. It was between 8:30 and 9 Wednesday morning in what seemed like a rush-hour commute.

To my joy and delight, the car I was on wasn’t overly crowded, and things were quiet, which made it even more disturbing when someone who was NOT the train operator (the voice was completely different) got on the train’s intercom and began screaming, “Oh my god! We’re going too fast! I can’t stop. I can’t stop!”

Startled, I looked up from my book and looked around. Other passengers were also startled, but we soon realized it wasn’t an emergency and probably some kind of prank.

The train continued to run smoothly, though the next times the real train operator made announcements, he acted as though nothing happened. Needless to say, my heart didn’t stop racing until I was off the train.

From Z:

I was traveling on a Red Line train in the direction Shady Grove Tuesday morning on my way to work when the train operator came over the loudspeaker a minute or two before arriving at the NY Ave. stop to shout, "I can't stop, can't stop, can't stop!" in what I assume he thought was a hilarious joke.

Needless to say, neither I nor any of the other passengers in the car were amused in the slightest.

Comments (22)

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+11 Vote up Vote down

Sizzle · 707 weeks ago

Probably another Metro hitching a ride with the train operator.

Someone call Jackie Jeter and get that man his official WMATA reprimand (which includes a promotion and paid vacation).

1 reply · active 707 weeks ago

0 Vote up Vote down

Sizzle · 707 weeks ago

*Metro employee.

It's still kinda early...

+2 Vote up Vote down

Soylent Green Line · 707 weeks ago

I agree that it is almost assuredly not the train operator making these announcements. OPs should be submitting there stories to the MTP.

+15 Vote up Vote down

John · 707 weeks ago

I hope you guys got the Time and # of that train. Otherwise nothing will come of this.

If you did get the time and # of that train, then there will be a 2 week vacation for the offender.

He's probably hoping you got the time and # of that train.

+8 Vote up Vote down

UnSuck Fan · 707 weeks ago

I'm a daily red line rider, but I wasn't on the train when this happened.

Personally, I don't care whether the idiot who was pretending the train was careening out of control was joking or not. It was incredibly stupid, thoughtless, reckless, and immature! He's one of those idiots who thinks it's okay to yell "fire" or "bomb" in a crowded area.

Unfortunately, this is WMATA so it's more than likely that he won't be reprimanded, and there's no cure for stupidity and immaturity.

1 reply · active 707 weeks ago

+4 Vote up Vote down

Anon5 · 707 weeks ago

Incidentally, yelling 'fire' or 'bomb' in a crowded area IS a crime.

+4 Vote up Vote down

@KCoxDC · 707 weeks ago

I had something very like this happen when I was taking the red line inbound from Silver Spring last week. We were somewhere between Fort Totten and Takoma, actually very close to where the collision was in 2009. I thought the train's intercom had gotten mixed up with the PA - it wasn't panicked shouting, but the words I made out were "can't stop" and "no, can't go -- can't see." (The PA to the car I was in was mostly non-functional, cut out and static.)

When the train continued to drive and brake as normal I figured it was sorted. But especially given that it's the same end of the red line, it sounds suspiciously similar.

+8 Vote up Vote down

dcn8v · 707 weeks ago

It worries me to think that it was the operator him or herself, and it also worries me to think that someone else was able to access the intercom.

Best case scenario, maybe it was a Michael Winslow wannabe.

-4 Vote up Vote down

YTK · 707 weeks ago

Trust me if he could not stop he'd be running out of that little cubicle and down the aisle in a heartbeat. No way would he stay at the controls if he could not stop.

1 reply · active 707 weeks ago

+30 Vote up Vote down

efroh · 707 weeks ago

Oh really? Just like Jeanice McMillan, the operator of the train involved in that 2009 crash on the Red Line who stayed at her post to activate the brakes and died for it?

+5 Vote up Vote down

kelly · 707 weeks ago

An operator on the Green line, at night, sometimes announces at the Columbia Height stop "Get you some keerrrnnn bread!" before he opens the doors. Yeah, it's funny. Also inappropriate and weird.

+2 Vote up Vote down

anon · 707 weeks ago

I'll bet you dollars to donuts that someone left a control section unlocked, probably one from a car well away from the first car, and some joker went in and had a little misguided fun.

6 replies · active 707 weeks ago

+4 Vote up Vote down

Jones · 707 weeks ago

Either that, or someone tapped into the intercom system some other way. It's never happened to me on a Metro train, but I have been in places where someone has managed to get access to the PA system and was messing around with it. It's probably not too hard to do with some of the simpler systems.

0 Vote up Vote down

Paul · 707 weeks ago

Speaking of leaving things unlocked... I've been riding metro to and from work for eleven years, and I ride usually on the weekends as well. Five times in the past year and a half I've been on trains where the end doors (ones going from car to car) are not shut. They will literally open and swing from the wind until one of us goes and shuts them. Only a few weeks ago I took my three year old son to the zoo via metro and when we boarded he wanted to hold onto the vertical bar (I have bleach wipes), but then as we started moving he noticed the door was open and went walking over to check it out. I jumped up and grabbed him, but it seems incredibly irresponsible for a metro employee to not be absolutely certain the doors are shut behind them when they walk from one end of the train to the other. Anyway, maybe it's one of the Red Line operators because I only ever had this happen on that line and it's been a recent issue.

+12 Vote up Vote down

GDopplerXT · 707 weeks ago

I've seen plenty of people who are not Metro employees walk through those doors, so there's a reasonable chance it was an irresponsible customer, not a Metro employee.

+2 Vote up Vote down

spidermonkey · 707 weeks ago

oh my god the doors between the cars are open we are all going to die aAAAAAAAAAAhhh

+6 Vote up Vote down

Phew · 707 weeks ago

But everything was OK - he had bleach wipes.

0 Vote up Vote down

dddddda · 707 weeks ago

Actually, several years ago a child DID die trying to go through the doors between cars, after being separated from its mother. The was rehashed in the news after the doors closing on stroller incident. So, despite the weird aside about bleach wipes, it appears there *is* good reason for this parent to worry.