Looked Like A Suicide Attempt At Metrotown Mall Today

by Alan Yu
6/28/2009
12 Comments

Off topic, but this was a surprising day as in the metrotown mall there was this guy that looked like he was threatening to jump off the walkway area that connected the skytrain to the main mall. Right below him was the bus loop too and as a result all of the public transportation was closed down as well. Guy looked like he was in his late 30â€™s to 40â€™s or so as you can see here:

And for all you that want to see an actual video of the incident I took a quick video capture of it too:

I didnâ€™t stick around to watch the whole ordeal. In general, you can see the guy constantly looking down and the security that was watching him. The interesting thing was apparently not too far away there was some other arrests that cause a commotion too. Makes you wonder if this was related in anyway. I guess this kind of ruined some peopleâ€™s shopping plans for the weekend.

12 Comments

no name 6/28/2009

oh dear, i was there when that happened and it did ruin my time with my best friend. urgghh, i wish that guy didnt make a big commotion about it.
anonymous 6/28/2009

I was there today too.
It was so annoying, they closed off everything.
does anyone know if he actually jumped or if they got him to get off?
Inetgeek 6/29/2009

I hope he is alright?

I cant find any news at all exept this blog.
I was there and prayed that he would not jump, seems like he is sick and needs some help.

please post if you have any info if the guy died or is in jail or what happened, thanks
Alan Yu 6/29/2009

This was the official statement from the police:

Burnaby – Police incident at Metrotown Skytrain Station
File # 2009-31457 2009-06-28 15:48 PDT

The Burnaby RCMP and the South Coast British Columbia Transportation Authority Police Service were dealing with a suicidal male at the Metrotown Skytrain Station which resulted in a road closure and some disrupted bus services.

The Burnaby RCMP were called to the Metrowtown Skytrain Station around 2:20pm. After a lengthy negotiation the man agreed to come to safety and was arrested around 4:00pm.

Central Blvd was closed during this time but all services and roads are operating normally now.
A Viewer 6/29/2009

Stupid of police and Translink to not let buses and Skytrain keep running, as it had nothing near to do with the guy. Instead of cordoning off 10 feet around the guy, they more or less cordoned off half a mile all around the guy, and made everyone walk 20 minutes to the next Skytrain stop. Verrrry stupid. They made a big thing out of nothing – all they had to do was put a net below the guy and tell him to jump, or push him off and arrest him. Didn’t look like he was ever going to jump anyhow. He seemed to be enjoying the attention. Gettin him to jump into a net would have stopped it all in minutes. Instead they disrupted everything for hours on end and inconvenience thousands. Very poor leadership from the top and dumb straight line thinking. They should have used lateral thinking to solve this problem.
lviyy 6/29/2009

I was taking the train to Vancouver direction when the train to Royal Oak direction came to a sudden stop at Metrotwon…was wondering why, by the time we came back, we had to get off at Patterson and walk back to the mall to catch a movie at 4pm…fortunately the weather was beautiful so taking a walk was pretty nice but just wondered why it happened, and there was no where to find news update of the incident. It is good no one was hurt or injured.
JAIME 8/12/2009

one more idiot ,i hope he is in jail,i have to pay$12 taxi because you asshole.
JAIME 8/12/2009

police worry about this asshole? and stop the train? that is very stupid.
JAIME 8/12/2009

if i am a police i tell him to jump 😛 👿
JAIME 8/12/2009

we d’ont have to worry about asshole like him,let him jump,and we pay less taxes
Kendall 9/1/2009

Jaime your a stigmatizing piece of trash!! If your child were born with an illness one day I geuss you would be cheering him on to jump!!
veronica 6/5/2011

the day there was a medical emergency at joice, in May 2011. the translink should be a little bit smart to think on all the people in need.
they shut down all the buses to joice and the buses 41 and 43 were being stoped at kingsway and joice and ruppert. it is shame how many long buses were parked all along kinsway and leaving all people along kingsway for one small little trolley to bring all us us to metrotown station, but there was no buses taking people to royal oak or to broadway. what a waste of service, and so rude when asked to do it better. any way the insident is at one station they can perfectly brings trains more close to other stations.