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Tokyo’s history of third-party injuries in train suicides

A woman walking on a platform at Zoshiki Station was injured by flying body parts of a man who had just been struck by an oncoming train in an apparent suicide
A woman walking on a platform at Zoshiki Station was injured by flying body parts of a man who had just been struck by an oncoming train in an apparent suicide

TOKYO (TR) – On Sunday, a woman in her 20s walking on a train station platform received light injuries after being struck by parts of the body of a person who had just been hit by an oncoming express train in a likely suicide.

According to Nippon News Network (Jan. 9), a third party being injured as a result of a person taking their own life in such a manner is not unprecedented in the Tokyo metropolitan area — with the latest case possibly spurring a preventative action.

In July of 2011, a woman, aged in her 40s, leaped in front of a Narita Express train at Shin-Koiwa Station in Katsushika Ward, Tokyo. The woman’s body was sent flying into a sales stall on the platform, resulting in a broken window and four injured passengers.

Four years before, a man jumped onto the tracks of the Tokaido Shinkansen at Shin-Yokohama Station in Yokohama, Kanagawa Prefecture. The impact with a train dislodged paving stones from the track bed and sent them flying onto the platform, injuring a male passenger.

In 2006, a man flung himself in front of a Romance Car limited express traveling through Sagamihara Station in Sagamihara City, Kanagawa on the Odakyu Main Line. Nine persons inside the train were subsequently injured by shards of glass sent flying after his body shattered a window upon impact.

In the recent case, a man, aged in his 20s, jumped onto the tracks at Zoshiki Station, located in Tokyo’s Ota ward, and in front of an oncoming express train on the Keikyu Main Line. The impact sent parts of his body onto the platform, striking the face and arm of the woman.

In each case, the collision was the result of an express train passing through a non-express stop.

According to Nippon News Network, Keikyu is considering adding a protective barrier on the platform at Zoshiki Station as a preventative measure.