News
Witness waved hands to warn girl doomed by selfie craze
View(s):By Kasun Warakapitiya
A foreigner takes a picture of herself while crossing a rail track at Fort
The station master of a small railway station off Ambalangoda walked out of his office onto the platform last Sunday just as the express train from Galle to Maradana was approaching the station.
There was no scheduled stop at Padampagama station. “Usually I never come out from the station when this particular train passes by as it does not stop here and there was no requirement for me to be outside,” Station Master Sanjeewa Manikku Badduge, 32, said.
As he stood watching the train approach he saw a horrifying sight.
“I saw a foreign girl seated on the footboard of the third carriage, which was not crowded. The train was 100 yards away.
“She was dressed in reddish-pink shoes and outfit. She was busy taking selfie photos from a mobile phone. I waved my hands and yelled to warn her that the platform was the same height as the footboard and that she would be hurt when the train goes past the platform,” he said.
“Within seconds the train reached the station. I saw the girl’s legs hitting the platform and she being dragged along before finally falling under the train onto the track.”
Her dismembered body was found after the train passed by.
Station Master Manikku Badduge gave his evidence at a hearing last Friday before Magistrate Rajindra Jayasuriya.
The girl, identified as 25-year-old Chen Ya Shi, had been travelling to Colombo to fly home that evening after spending her holiday down south, Police Sergeant Githanada de Silva said.
The station master was able to identify the victim as a Chinese national only after a friend who had been accompanying her in the train got off at the next station, Ambalangoda, and rushed back to Padampagama by three-wheeler.
Shuu Slien-E confirmed to the magisterial inquiry that her friend had been seated on the footboard, taking selfies, while she had been taking pictures of her friend.
Station Master Manikku Badduge said this was the second incident he had witnessed of a person being killed while trying to take a selfie.
He had seen a local schoolgirl being run over by a train at Ambalangoda while attempting to take a photo capturing her and the approaching train.
“Selfies have become a new trend where every event of the day is expressed through a photograph,” he said. “Accidents are avoidable if people take precautions.”
The dead girl’s father, Chen Chi Gi-Yan, who arrived in Sri Lanka with his wife for the funeral, sought a court order to carry out his daughter’s cremation in Colombo and take the ashes back home.
Coffin containing the remains of the train-selfie victim being transported. Pix by Athula Devapriya
The incident came as two Sri Lankan girls living with their families in Oman were drowned last weekend when one of them, trying to take a selfie near a spring at a picnic ground fell into the water and the other tried to help but was also dragged into the water.
Health Ministry Deputy Director Dr.Thilak Siriwardena said accidents involving selfies are regularly reported from outstation areas where people have been holidaying and posing for photos in extremely dangerous situations on heights, near animals, while driving or swimming.
He said the taking of selfies would be formally listed as a cause of death if the trend increased.
For every death caused by taking selfies there are more than 10 serious injuries, the official dealing with youth affairs at the Health Ministry, Dr Ananda Jayalal, said. Most of the injuries are caused to the head and spinal cord, and there are drownings, rib fractures and stab wounds.
Schoolchildren must be educated about potential danger near water and at heights and cautioned against taking selfies in dangerous situations, the Senior Examiner of the Lifesaving Association, Asanka Nanayakkara said.
