The dismaying Instagram video that seems to have been shot from across a platform shows a woman with her head being trapped between the doors of a New York subway while her bag hangs outside the doors. The rest of her body is still inside the stationary train.
The plight of the woman catches the attention of many commuters but all of them simply choose to turn a blind eye. Even a woman wearing the uniform of a Metropolitan Transportation Authority official walks past without batting an eyelid.
In the clip, the woman's head can be seen sticking out of the subway doors, her handbag dangling out as well. The rest of her body remains inside the train compartment. The train is stopped at a station.
Strangely, the woman does not seem particularly distressed by her predicament nor does she call out for help. A person in the background can be heard yelling for someone to open the doors.
The video that has earned more than 1.2 million views, at the time of writing, has also drawn a lot of flak for the one who shot it with many slamming the person for preferring filming the incident over helping the woman out.
Watch the video here:
The video appears to have been filmed by a passenger in another train across the platform.
"No one helped this lady. Shame on them," comments one person on the Instagram video.
"The fact that no one stopped to help is alarming," adds another.
One person lashes out at the person filming, asking why he or she did not help: "...there's a human being behind a 'camera' filming the whole thing...instead of helping this woman...Nothing should have that much control over you, to where you don't even help people."
The video ends before it can be established how the woman was finally freed and how long she remained trapped like that. It remains unclear which New York City subway station the video was filmed in or whether the woman suffered any injuries.