Subway Saviors Share Story

Story by CBS News, 11/11/09

(CBS)   Two Boston transit workers are being hailed as heroes after an incident last Friday night when a woman police say appeared to be drunk fell onto the tracks as a train approached.

Jackie Osorio, a train inspector for the Massachusetts Bay Transit Authority, saw the woman on the tracks and immediately got on the radio and told the driver of the speeding train to stop.

Her quick call came in the nick of time.

Osorio and Charice Lewis, the train's operator, appeared on "The Early Show" and described the frantic scene on the subway platform.

Lewis said she could see several people in the distance on the platform, waving at the train. She said that, because people were across the yellow line -- an area cordoned off for safety's sake -- "common sense" kicked in and she began to slow down just in case someone was on the tracks.

"Then the woman moved," Lewis said, "which made me notice she was in there and that the passengers were pointing in there, and I just emergency braked and the train stopped just in time."

Osorio called the scene "horrific." She noted that one man at the end of the platform turned away from the woman on the tracks at the last moment when it looked like the train was upon her.

"It was a crazy situation," Osorio said. "... I honestly thought it was going to end badly. The train as it approached was coming in a little slower than usual, but with these trains you never know what's going to happen."

Lewis said she also expected a bad picture.

"All I saw was the train go over her body," she said. "I was just like, 'Oh, my God. This is going to be so bad.'"

The train stopped halfway over the woman's body. She was rescued without injury.

For more with Osorio and Lewis, click on the video below.

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