Increase in ‘subway surfing’ deaths prompts calls for safeguards

Vaishali Honawar was alone in her Silver Spring, Md., home on June 20 when she heard the doorbell ring at 9:45 p.m. Her husband, Desikan Thirunarayanapuram, a Washington Post editor, was at work. The couple had been trying to reach their son, Jay, but he hadn’t responded to texts or phone calls, and Honawar was beginning to worry.

When she opened the door and saw two Metro Transit police detectives standing outside, a wave of panic swept over her.

“Can we come in and visit with you?” one asked.

The detectives sat down on a couch and quietly told her that Jay was found next to the Metro tracks near the Rhode Island Avenue station that afternoon. They said it appeared he had been videotaping himself for social media when he slipped while riding atop a Metro train, a practice known as subway surfing - an escalating problem for some major transit agencies.

Jay Thirunarayanapuram, a gifted artist who had just completed his freshman year at Albert Einstein High School, died five days after he turned 15.

Honawar called her husband, who raced home in a fog of tears and disbelief. This couldn’t be real, the couple thought. When can we see him? They’ve made a mistake.

But there was no mistake. The smiling, outgoing boy they had adopted from India when he was 6 and brought to their Maryland home was gone.

Jay’s parents acknowledge he was a victim of his own risky behavior. He liked to explore and take chances. Danger had appealed to him after growing up in Mumbai with little oversight, and he had an ingrained sense of fearlessness. But in recent months, Jay had gone too far and was getting into trouble. They had him in therapy, but in some ways, it seemed, he could not be reached.

But they also said Metro should have more restrictions and warning systems in place, such as alarms or cameras, to make it harder for people to access dangerous areas on trains. Like some other parents who have lost children to subway surfing, they are calling on social media platforms to remove subway surfing videos from their sites.

“There’s a limit to what parents can do,” Honawar said, sitting with her husband in their living room, with large portraits of Jay and an exquisitely detailed drawing of a horse he had done displayed nearby. “We need the social media companies to step up. We need Metro to step up so that we can all work together to stop this.”

Reports of subway surfing are relatively rare on Metro trains, according to Metro officials. “We understand this is an industry-wide issue and are collaborating with other agencies on best practices to prevent these types of incidents,” the agency said in a statement, reiterating its policies and noting there are signs prohibiting dangerous activity.

The agency said it has not made changes to its policies or procedures following Jay’s death. “We will continue observation of CCTV, provide law enforcement updates and communicate with the public to prevent risky and dangerous behavior,” Metro said in a statement. Metro has recorded five incidents of people riding on top of cars since the beginning of 2021, with two of those resulting in injuries.

But those numbers do not reflect the extent of dangerous behavior, according to a review of online activity and interviews with young people in the Washington, D.C., region who say they regularly ride between cars and occasionally on top of them.

Five teenage boys, speaking on the condition of anonymity to be candid, told The Post in separate interviews that they and their friends have sat or stood on top of moving Metro trains. They also sent videos of them riding on top of trains that they have posted to their TikTok and Instagram accounts. Many young people, they said, often ride between cars as they hurtle along the tracks at speeds reaching 65 mph. Metro’s count of subway surfers does not include individuals who ride between cars.

Incidents of subway surfing have been reported this year in Philadelphia, Chicago and Boston. But in New York, it has reached crisis levels. Four young teenagers died this year from injuries suffered riding on top of Metropolitan Transit Authority trains. There have been five subway surfing fatalities in the previous four years.

“Subway surfing is incredibly dangerous, and we lost another young life to it this week,” the office of New York Mayor Eric Adams (D) tweeted in June following the death of a 14-year-old who fell off the L Train in Brooklyn. “He had just graduated from junior high, and now he’s gone. Don’t ride outside the train. It’s never worth the risk.”

Last year, the MTA reported 928 people riding outside of trains, which includes on top of, in between or anywhere outside the train. That was up from 206 in 2021.

“We’re perplexed,” MTA’s president, Richard Davey, said in an interview, but he pointed to what he sees as one of the leading causes for the behavior. “Social media is clearly playing a role in glorifying this incredibly dangerous and in some instances life-losing activity.”

Videos from social media reveal a range of dangerous behavior on Metro trains and trains in other systems. They show young teenagers, mostly boys, sitting on top of Metro cars or standing between the cars and raising their heads above roof level as the trains move. Videos from New York show groups of teens standing on trains, and others show people riding while holding to the outside of the train.

Social media companies contacted for this article, including TikTok and YouTube, pointed to their guidelines, which prohibit posting videos that promote dangerous or unhealthy behavior. TikTok’s guidelines read, “We do not allow showing or promoting dangerous activities and challenges. This includes dares, games, tricks, inappropriate use of dangerous tools, eating substances that are harmful to one’s health, or similar activities that may lead to significant physical harm.”

A TikTok spokesperson said the company actively works to remove such videos from its site through a combination of automated removal and human screening. In the first quarter of 2023, it removed approximately 91 million videos of all kinds from the site because they violated community guidelines, spokesperson Ben Rathe said.

Davey said social media companies have been responsive to MTA’s requests to remove subway surfing videos, but he says they can do more to make sure the content never gets online in the first place. “I just think this needs to continue to command their utmost attention,” he said.

In addition to asking social media to remove videos, the MTA is working with schools to educate children about the dangers of subway surfing and is increasing enforcement activity on subway lines where the behavior has increased, Davey said. But he acknowledged that given the young ages of the surfers, “there’s not really anything the criminal justice system can do.” Instead, he said, they need to rely on parents interceding and stronger messages in schools and on social media about the dangers.

Some parents in New York have called for the MTA to lock doors between subway cars, which is typically how people access the outside of trains. But Davey said that would present other safety issues if, for instance, a car needed to be evacuated.

Teenagers who take part in riding on the outside of the subway express different reasons for doing it. Some say they’re bored. Others say it’s a thrill. For some, it’s a real-life extension of a popular cartoon video game, Subway Surfers, where players run and leap on fast-moving trains while collecting coins and points.

Young people, particularly teenage boys, are much more susceptible to engaging in dangerous or risky behavior, said Adriana Galván, an adolescent brain development specialist at the University of California at Los Angeles. They are also less likely to perceive danger in the same way an older person would, she said, and are thrilled by the thought of doing something they can get away with.

Some risk-taking can be healthy and is part of the process of becoming less dependent on caregivers, Galván said. “For most adolescents, it’s okay. They get through relatively unscathed,” she said. “But for some adolescents, unfortunately, the envelope is pushed too far.”

The 15- and 16- year-olds interviewed for this article, who attend high schools in Virginia’s Fairfax County, Maryland’s Montgomery County and Washington, D.C., said they had been riding on top of or between trains for the past year or so. Most of them said they also took part in urban exploring, a growing niche activity posted to social media under the hashtag #urbex, documenting visits to abandoned and often dilapidated buildings that include former hospitals, schools, hotels and factories.

Exploring abandoned sites and riding on top of trains have long predated social media, but those interviewed for this article say they like posting their videos to social media as the platforms have brought newfound attention to the practices.

Popular destinations for urbex enthusiasts in Washington, D.C., include the decaying RFK Stadium; Spingarn High School in Northeast Washington, which closed in 2013; and the overrun Carter Barron Amphitheatre in Rock Creek Park, which has been closed since 2017.

There are also more dangerous activities engaged in by some urbex fans. They post videos from the tops of towering cranes they’ve climbed. They share footage of their legs dangling from the ledges of some of the nation’s capital’s tallest buildings. In a video recently posted to TikTok, four teenagers break into the construction site of the new Amazon building in Alexandria, Va., and post views from the top level.

Most of these locations have security to prevent trespassing, but the teens interviewed for this article say they are rarely caught and, if they are, are typically told not to come back.

Desikan Thirunarayanapuram said his son was active in urban exploring and especially enjoyed taking photographs that he posted online. But Jay grew more interested in its riskier aspects and in the subway surfing posts by others involved in urbex. “That seems to be the general trend among the urbex crowd,” Thirunarayanapuram said. “The next step is to climb tall buildings, to get a sense of height and movement. Riding freight trains, which Jay did, is a step before the rides on Metro trains.”

This year, Jay contacted a subway surfer in New York to express admiration for his videos.

“Y’all know teen urbanexers talkin around u all over the states right?” Jay texted. “My friends and I respect y’all so much bruh.”

A few minutes later, the surfer texted about the dangers involved. “I know your not new or anything but these trains are unexpected sometimes. . . . I actually had my friend pass away surfing.”

“Dawg that gotta suck, sorry for your loss,” Jay responded. “Keep on living his dreams tho. Only way to move forward in my opinion.”

“Yea for sure bro people call me dumb for continuing after his death but s--- it’s the only way i feel alive,” the New Yorker replied.

Jay’s parents now have access to his phone and accounts. They scroll through his photos, posts and texts, remembering the boy they love and miss so deeply. On June 21, the day after Jay died, the New York rider sent him a message.

“You good?”