In a reckless stunt that turned tragic, a 15-year-old-boy is in critical condition in a NYC hospital, as of Friday, with a severe head injury suffered while surfing on the roof of a NYC subway train last week. 

He is not the first person who has been playing this dangerous game and some have died while doing it. Subway “surfers” have filmed their activities and posted their videos on social media. A man was discovered on the top of a 5 train in 2019, and in 2021, a 32-year-old man died while subway surfing on a J train going over the Williamsburg Bridge. The MTA has been aware of the phenomenon for a while, and says there have been 449 “subway surfing” incidents as of May of this year. A look at Twitter will reveal a shocking number of tweets about the daredevil “sport.”

The teenager is believed to have been on the roof of the Number 7 train in Queens, when he hit his head on an unknown object, according to NYC police. He was found on the roof of the train with massive head trauma and is fighting for his life.

NYPD Transit Chief Jason Wilcox said the increase in the reckless behavior may be in part due to young people seeing the videos on social media.

“We have hundreds of recorded incidents that this has occurred in our system in the last few months,” Richard Davey, president of New York City Transit, said Monday during an MTA meeting. “I am going to implore anyone who is watching this to tell your kids, to tell your friends: Do not do this.”

There are also reports and videos of people hanging on to the backs of subway train cars – also very dangerous.