More than a dozen people hospitalized after smoke fills NYC subway station: FDNY

More than a dozen people were hospitalized after smoke filled an Upper Manhattan subway station during the afternoon commute Tuesday, officials said. The unspecified “smoke condition” began inside the No.1 train station at 191st Street and St.

Nicholas Avenue in Fort George around 12:50 p.m., the FDNY said. A total of 12 FDNY units, including 60 firefighters and EMS workers, descended on the scene, officials said. Eighteen civilians suffered minor injuries, mostly related to smoke inhalation – with 16 taken to local hospitals and two refusing medical attention, the department said. The FDNY says the cause and origin of the smoke is under investigation, but that it was placed under control within about an hour.A man who was on the train posted on Facebook that the smoke appeared to stem from an electrical fire. “All of a sudden, the electrical socket exploded and turned into fire, filling that side of the station with smoke, and it was heading in our direction,” he wrote.“The whole station was filled with smoke.”The straphanger said the situation could’ve turned far more dire. “That’s where my survivor skills that I have learned kicked in,” he wrote.

“Luckily, the station has a tunnel that leads us outside to Broadway.If we did not have the tunnel, most likely most of us would have suffocated.

When all the smoke was coming in my direction it was real.”The smoky scene snarled subway service in both directions between 215th and 145th streets, according to an MTA alert. ...