A terrifying video of an underground station where a man was swallowed by an escalator as a huge gaping hole appeared beneath his feet is going viral on the internet and has shocked many.
As per BBC, the incident took place at Ayazaga Metro station in Istanbul, Turkey in February 2018.
The CCTV video shows commuters walking down the escalators. The man steps onto a few steps on the escalator and then finds himself unexpectedly clinging to the handrail. However, he is unable to hold on and is swallowed by the malfunctioning escalator. It appears as if the escalator split beneath him.
Watch the video here.
The man, identified as Mehmet Ali Erik, is said to have spent an hour caught inside the escalator's mechanisms as other commuters tried and failed to free him. He was ultimately saved by firefighters, BBC stated citing Turkish newspaper Evrensel. An ambulance then drove him to the hospital so he could receive medical attention for his wounds.
The broken escalator was allegedly marked with a warning notice, according to Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality (IBB). Many people can still be seen using it in the footage.
Many people reacted to the video on Twitter. A person commented, "If I didn't have a reason to fear escalators, I do now."
"Escalator failure is a bit of an understatement," said another person.
A third person said, "From now on I'm using the stairs."
"This is the scariest thing I have ever seen," commented a user.
