Teenager Aiyden O’Donoghue ended up with shattered legs and cuts to his face after hanging off a train while taking part in a social media trend called ‘buffer riding’ last year.
The now 16-year-old had broken into the back carriage of a train as it passed Bankstown Station to participate in the trend, which consists of hanging from the back of a moving train and recording the stunt for social media.
As he was dangling from the back of the speeding train, he looked away from the tracks and his body hit a pole, sending him flying onto the railway.
“I got unlucky… Climbed down the steps, looked back for a second and got cleaned up by a pole,” the teenager said.
“It’s still a bit hazed, according to my friend I rolled about eight or nine times once I hit the ground.”
“I remember coming to. I was covered in blood, I couldn’t move my leg so I knew something was wrong with it.”
The then 15-year-old shattered his right femur and broke his left ankle.
He also cut his face in the fall.
A year later, the teenager and his mother are speaking out to warn other teenagers of the dangers of the trend.
His mother, Aime Davis, said she thought her son was dead upon receiving a call about what had happened.
”(I thought) I’d lost my son… No parent should ever have a phone call like that ever.”
“Aiden explained to me why he was doing it, it was a rush I think in one aspect he described it as being high… It was a big adrenaline thing.
“You know it’s not worth it, it’s not worth the risk.”
O’Donoghue was forced into a wheelchair for five to six months while recovering.
“There is that massive feeling you are untouchable, you are not going to get hurt, you’ll be the one that doesn’t,” O’Donoghue said.
“It’s only a matter of time until you do get hurt… It’s just a probability.”
Sydney trains and NSW Police have seen more than 350 cases of buffer riding in the last year, a 143 per cent increase from last year.
“We don’t want to be the ones knocking on the door of parents advising their children have been injured because they have been riding on the outside of train,” NSW Police Superintendent Todd Cunningham.
Police, Davis and O’Donoghue say the adrenaline rush is not worth the risk, and have encouraged teenagers to stop and think before participating in the potentially deadly trend.
