Brooklyn Bridge-Mexican ship collision eyewitness says ‘someone dangled for 15 minutes’
The Mexican Navy said in a statement that 22 people on board the training ship were injured, three of them critically.
Chaos erupted in New York on Saturday when the Mexican Navy's training ship slammed into the Brooklyn Bridge, ripping off the top of its towering masts and leaving uniformed sailors dangling from crossbeams.
The tense moment was caught on video and quickly spread across social media. Footage shows the ship, with some 200 people on board, gliding toward the historic suspension bridge before its masts violently collide with the bridge’s steel undercarriage.
Clad in white naval uniforms, dozens of crew members were seen clinging to the rigging on the damaged masts.
Cuauhtemoc ship: All about the Mexican navy vessel that collided with Brooklyn Bridge
Some sailors were left suspended mid-air, holding on to crossbars for safety as pieces of the ship’s rigging splintered around them.
Panic also spread onshore. Near the South Street Seaport, crowds of bystanders were seen sprinting away from the waterfront.
'Saw someone dangling...': Witness describes Brooklyn Bridge crash scene
Sydney Neidell and Lily Katz told The Associated Press they were sitting outside to watch the sunset when they saw the vessel strike the bridge and one of its masts snap. Looking closer, they saw someone dangling high on the ship.
“We saw someone dangling, and I couldn't tell if it was just blurry or my eyes, and we were able to zoom in on our phone, and someone was dangling from the harness from the top for like at least like 15 minutes before they were able to rescue them,” Katz said.
They said they saw two people removed from the ship on stretchers onto smaller boats.
2 dead, 19 injured: New York mayor
Two people have died and 19 people sustained injuries while two after a Mexican Navy ship carrying 277 passengers lost power and crashed into the Brooklyn Bridge, Mayor of New York City, Eric Adams, said on Sunday (local time).
Earlier, the Mexican Navy said in its statement that no one had fallen into the water and that no rescue operation had been launched, AFP reported.
"No personnel fell into the water, so it was not necessary to activate rescue operations," the statement added, following the accident involving the Cuauhtemoc training vessel.
