A 16-year-old Long Island boy fell 50 feet into a shaft at the Queensboro Bridge while trying to pull off a boneheaded TikTok challenge, police and law enforcement sources said.
Cops responded to a 911 call on the Queens end of the East River around 5:45 p.m. Monday and found the teen stuck in the shaft, an NYPD spokesperson said Tuesday.
First-responders pulled the boy to safety and rushed him to New York Presbyterian Hospital Weill Cornell, where he was listed in critical but stable condition, police said.
Firefighters responded to a 911 call of a person injured on the Queensboro Bridge on Monday. William Miller
Police said a 16-year-old boy fell 50 feet and was injured on the Queensboro Bridge. Citizen app
Sources said the Long Island teen was filming a stung for TikTok when he was injured. @nycemergencymgtThe teen, who is from Lynbrook in Nassau County, was not identified.
FDNY Deputy Chief Nicholas Corrado said at a press briefing at the scene that 75 first-responders and 10 pieces of apparatus were needed in the rescue.
“This was a confined-space operation, which is a very difficult, time-consuming, manpower-intensive operation,” Corrado said. “It involved high-angle equipment, ropes, we have to monitor the air, and create high points.”
Sources told The Post the boy was filming a stunt to post on TikTok when he fell.
The popular online app has come under attack in recent years for allowing a string of dangerous and potentially dangerous stunts to be widely shared and not removed from the platform.
Those include the Benadryl Challenge, which has TikTokers popping at least a dozen tablets of the name brand antihistamine, the Tide Challenge, which encourages kids to munch on laundry detergent capsules, and the Fire Challenge, which inexplicably has teens lathering themselves with rubbing alcohol or hand sanitizer and setting themselves on fire for a thrill.
