Long Island man, 61, dies after getting sucked into MRI machine while wearing large metal chain

https://nypost.com/2025/07/18/us-news/long-island-man-dies-after-getting-sucked-into-mri-machine-while-wearing-large-metal-chain/

https://archive.ph/xUkt2

Long Island man, 61, dies after getting sucked into MRI machine while wearing large metal chain​

By
Shane Galvin
Published July 18, 2025, 5:19 p.m. ET
455 Comments



A 61-year-old man who was sucked into an MRI machine on Long Island while wearing a metal neck chain has died from his injuries, authorities revealed Friday.
The freak accident happened Wednesday at Nassau County Open MRI in Westbury when the man was pulled into the magnetic resonance imaging machine by his “large metal chain,” Nassau County cops said in a release.

The freak incident occurred Wednesday at Nassau Open MRI in Westbury, Long Island.Brigitte Stelzer
The 61-year-old was not authorized to be in the imaging room.Brigitte Stelzer
The unidentified victim immediately suffered a serious medical episode and was pronounced dead at a North Shore University Hospital on Thursday, police said.

455
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Officials said the man was not a patient but was accompanying someone else who was to undergo a medical scan, ABC reported.
Witnesses told CBS the man defied orders to stay out of the MRI room because his relative was screaming in pain.
The man’s cause of death was not revealed by officials, but a staff doctor at North Shore University Hospital speculated on what could have happened.
“If this was a chain that was wrapped around the neck, I could imagine any kind of strangulation injuries that could happen,” Dr. Payal Sud told CBS.

“Asphyxiation, cervical spine injuries.
An investigation is underway, but no criminality is suspected.

 

[Jump]

Another fun one is trying to quickly move an aluminum plate into the field with the flat side to the magnet. The faster you try to move it the more it will resist you. If you bring it slowly into the field there is barely an effect but shove it hard and it is like pushing a wall.

 

[Gef Mongoose]

Why was he even wearing weight training chains around his neck to his wife’s MRI appointment in the first place?

I can’t fathom any gym bro that I know of doing that.

 

[Hermiöne Granger]

This is some crazy stuff..

Wife speaks after husband sucked into MRI machine dies, says he was 'snatched'​

 

[Return of the Freaker]

One of the easiest rounds of Guess the Race in a while

 

[JosephStalin]

This is some crazy stuff..

Wife speaks after husband sucked into MRI machine dies, says he was 'snatched'​

Something makes no sense here. Lady says she needed help getting out of the machine after MRI done. That machine would have been turned off, and a staff member would have helped, from personal experience. During the procedure there is nobody in the room, but they are watching you. And someone wearing a 20-pound chain and a lock, at 61? What the fuck?

This MRI center needs to lawyer up because there's a lawsuit coming, least until it gets thrown out of court.

Sometimes I wonder if I live on a totally different planet than some other people.

 

[SITHRAK!]

NY Post link.
His family are now saying he was ‘led in’ to the room by a ‘forgetful technician’ and died after ‘several heart attacks’. No waiting for the coroner to make a finding here!

Lining up fo’ dat lawsuit, need mo’ money fo’ dem fitness chains.

 

[Blewberry Nausea]

NY Post link.
His family are now saying he was ‘led in’ to the room by a ‘forgetful technician’ and died after ‘several heart attacks’. No waiting for the coroner to make a finding here!

Lining up fo’ dat lawsuit, need mo’ money fo’ dem fitness chains.

Just waiting for the GoFundMe link for the lawsuit.

 

[El Gordo Ramsay Sex Dwarf]

One of the easiest rounds of Guess the Race in a while

How about Gauss the Race?

 

[The Connected Nose]

Depending on the machine, that could be a multi-million dollar piece of equipment completely scrapped

Even if there was no damage from the foreign objects or the quench, you're still looking at a minimum of $30-50k to refill the liquid helium and re-ramp the magnet.

That machine would have been turned off

An MRI is never completely "off" and therefore they're always dangerous if you get metal near them. They use liquid helium to keep a niobium-titanium coil in a superconducting state. On initial installation, the reservoir is filled and capped and the refrigeration system turned on, then over a couple of days they slowly ramp-up the energy to the coil. Usually to 500-1000 amps. Since the coil is superconducting, electrical resistance within the coil is zero, so the current continues to circulate around it indefinitely, essentially turning an electromagnet in to a permanent magnet (as long as it's kept cold).

They'll turn off the gradient coils and the exciters, but the main coil is always "on" until the system is decommissioned (or in an emergency, quenched). And that's the coil that can exert terrifying amounts of force.

 

[Dan Abrams]

There is a zero percent chance an MRI tech told a family member that they can just go in and help the patient. And the sad thing is the hospital is absolutely paying these niggers off.

 

[whoishomermynameis]

There is a zero percent chance an MRI tech told a family member that they can just go in and help the patient.

maybe it was a black MRI tech

 

[Tasty Tatty]

It literally says he wasn't allowed inside but went inside anyways. Just a failure to take orders seriously.

Wife is telling a different story about the tech saying he could come in to help his wife out of the mri, but why the fuck was he wearing any metal going into that room?

Why was he even wearing weight training chains around his neck to his wife’s MRI appointment in the first place?

I can’t fathom any gym bro that I know of doing that.

Gonna be that person and say that some people might be not aware that the M in MRI stands for "magnetic" and if they are, they don't believe it's that dangerous.

When you're kept out of any medical room, most would believe it's because you're putting the patient in danger, not that whatever they're doing inside is dangerous to you. With some exceptions like x-rays.

That's why we don't call them MRI or RE here, but "resonancia magnética". That sounds like Magneto is trying to kill the xmen and it's enough to stay away.

My guess is the machine  sucked him in and it folded him in half backwards.

 

[CircuSphere]

The wife will sue. The hospital will settle for at least a million bucks, probably more, because otherwise the jury would see the crying widow describing her husband getting his head ripped off or whatever.

Lol and the machine was worth up to three million.

 

[Sexy Peach Emoji]

Serious people do not wear large chains and padlocks around their necks or bodies when going to the hospital. Your ass isn't Rock Lee, leave your weight training shit at home or the gym.

 

[PoppyFizz]

Unless the hospital is ran by the same kind of nignog that got sucked through, there was no reason for this to happen. I've been through an MRI. You are in the room alone until the machine is off and it rolls you out of it. This is a case of someone going, "Sir you can't go in there" followed by "BIX NOOD".

 

[Peaches the Wonder Cat]

Here's a case from a few years ago in India... I'm not sure what the victim was thinking bringing an oxygen cylinder into a room with an MRI.

 

[Vibralldo]

Witnesses told CBS the man defied orders to stay out of the MRI room because his relative was screaming in pain.

That's why you listen to the medical staff

 

[Dysnomia]

NY Post link.
His family are now saying he was ‘led in’ to the room by a ‘forgetful technician’ and died after ‘several heart attacks’. No waiting for the coroner to make a finding here!

Lining up fo’ dat lawsuit, need mo’ money fo’ dem fitness chains.

So I was thinking he was decked out like Mr. T. But it was a weight training chain. Now I understand that not everybody realises how MRIs work and why you cannot wear any metal. It's up to the technician to tell you to remove metal from your person. Wearing a huge ass weight training chain is going to be a definite no-no since the machine is always technically on even when the magnet isn't spinning. Therefore if this is true then it's mostly the technician's fault:

“While my mother was laying on the table, the technician left the room to get her husband to help her off the table. He forgot to inform him to take the chain he was wearing from around his neck off when the magnet sucked him in,” daughter of Jones-McAllister, Samantha Bodden, wrote in a GoFundMe for burial costs.

But since there's conflicting reports I really don't know. What the hell kind of training did this technician receive to not think "Hey, I better tell this guy to remove that massive fucking chain first". If this is really how irresponsible they are then they shouldn't be working an MRI.

Since the facility is going to want to do damage control and the family isn't going to want their loved one to be seen as a Darwin Award winning fool there's gonna be some untruths all around. I'm sure all staff members have been told to shut it. So we probably will never get the whole story in 100% accuracy.

Lol and the machine was worth up to three million.

And I assume they had to turn it off to remove this guy. That can damage the magnet. An MRI may sometimes be powered down to save electricity. But they are seldom turned all the way off. The workings of an MRI are really intricate. If you have to suddenly shut the machine down you dump the liquid helium. It costa a fortune to turn it on and a fortune to turn it off.

 

[Make America Dumb Again]

Erik, is that you?



Jokes aside, Rest in Peace.

 

[The Connected Nose]

If you have to suddenly shut the machine down you dump the liquid helium. It costa a fortune to turn it on and a fortune to turn it off.

IIRC the helium dump is more a byproduct. They increase the resistance in the coil, which leads to heat, which boils the helium off and it blows out through a dedicated conduit. But yeah, IF nothing else damaged the device, and IF the shunt resistors properly sent the current to a safe external load, then you're still looking at a lot of time (meaning $$) inspecting, then more $$ replacing the liquid helium, and then several more days ($$) to bring the device back up to operational levels and re-calibrate everything. Just guessing out my ass here, but I'd say a week of downtime would have to be expected. Meaning lost revenue.