Source: Robert Nickelsberg / Getty
Thanks to social media, the dangerous practice of subway surfing reemerged as a popular trend in 2023 and though a few kids have already lost their lives partaking in the idiocy, teens continue to test their luck for the sake of a few likes on their social media pages.
Stepping up their efforts to deter today’s youth from risking their lives atop of train carts, the NYPD have turned to drones to track down wannabe daredevils and the results have been positive. According to the New York Daily News, fatalities have dropped over the last few months thanks to their eye in the sky devices which have already stopped four kids from attempting to ride the iron horse.
The New York Daily News reports:
Drones are being deployed to spot people who climb on top of subway trains on elevated lines, said NYPD transit chief Michael Kemper.
“Over the last several weeks the NYPD has been piloting a drone program that deploys drones near subway lines where we’ve seen very concerning and reckless acts of subway surfing,” Kemper told the MTA’s board.
In that time, Kemper said, the drone program has helped the department stop four subway surfers.
The youngest of the four — stopped by police a week ago — was 12 years old.
“With our team’s work, hopefully this 12-year-old will not subway-surf anymore, and will live to see the age of 13,” Kemper said.
Though the Transit Chief didn’t get into which subway lines were implementing the drone security method, elevated subway stations such as the J, M, 7, and Z lines are most commonly used by kids to subway surf.
While we’re sure kids are mad about not being able to get more views on their page thanks to the NYPD interfering in their death defying plans, we bet they’ll more than likely be thankful when they’re full grown adults reminiscing about the dumb things they did as kids.