Posted on 11/02/2025 2:22:46 PM PST by E. Pluribus Unum
It reminds New Yorkers of Colin Ferguson’s 1993 massacre on the Long Island Rail Road.
For those of us who ride the commuter rails and subways daily, Saturday night’s mass stabbing on a London-bound train is a nightmare brought to life. In such confined and well-lit spaces, there isn’t any way to do what the experts say you should: run, hide and, as a last resort, fight.
A train car moving at high speed with the doors and windows closed is a violent psychopath’s dream—a veritable barrel full of unarmed, unsuspecting fish. Most of us have our heads buried in our phones, our ears distracted by music or podcasts. Some of us are poring over newspapers or dreamily watching the countryside fly by. Rarely do any of us do a threat assessment of those nearby. We are in our own little in-between place—not home, not at work. En route. Vulnerable.
We don’t yet know the motive or circumstances behind the U.K. stabbing spree. Police detained two men after the train stopped in a town near Cambridge. British authorities, tight-lipped as usual, are emphasizing that they don’t think it’s terror-related. But the public can be forgiven for speculating that it might be. The U.K. has a growing problem with home-grown and foreign-born terrorism. Last month’s ramming and stabbing attack outside a Manchester synagogue remains fresh.
For New Yorkers of a certain vintage, this weekend’s incident calls to mind Colin Ferguson’s 1993 shooting rampage on the Long Island Rail Road. The paranoid and delusional Mr. Ferguson, then 35, opened fire on a car full of 80 passengers riding an evening train into New York City, killing six and wounding 19. Over the course of three bloody minutes, he emptied a 15-shot clip and managed to reload his 9mm pistol as terrified riders...
(Excerpt) Read more at wsj.com ...
Just shut up and celebrate it.
I wish I could find it now. But I once saw an old American newspaper ad for revolvers. The ad said something like, “Once in his life every man will need a pistol.”
Well, yeah. This UK train story is a good example of that.
Oh, wait. Even pepper spray is illegal in the UK. The British police instead recommend a whistle. So I guess a British ad would read:
“Once in his life every man will need a whistle.”
🙁
” there isn’t any way to do what the experts say you should”
Sure there is. You pull out your pistol and begin firing until the threat is stopped. that is what any expert would recommend.
And the train, it won’t stop going, no way to slow down...
What’s our strength again? I keep forgetting it.
It’s really only a nightmare for people not allowed to defend themselves with guns.
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