Cat on Sheepshead Train Tracks

Reader Celeste Leibowitz sent this in last night:

Today around noon my husband and I were waiting for the Manhattan-bound Q train on the Sheepshead Bay station when we noticed a number of transit police on the platform. The Q train pulled in halfway and then stopped. It appeared someone or something was on the tracks.

When we leaned over we could see a very pretty Siamese cat sitting quietly by the side of the tracks. The fact that it hadn’t dashed out of the way of the oncoming train told us it was either injured or sick.

A conversation between the conductor and the transit police ensued and one of the policemen used the front of the train to climb down onto the tracks and try to pick up the cat. The poor thing was definitely injured as it could not get up and run but could only try to scuttle out of the way as the officer tried to pick it up. He was having no luck capturing the cat, even with a canvas bag a passenger waiting on the platform handed him, when I got his attention and told him to get the cat by the scruff of the neck so it could not defend itself by attacking him (which it was trying to do).

The cat was removed and it was clear it had been injured, maybe hit by the previous train, because its legs and tail were damaged. Now this was a Siamese cat, an expensive breed, and I am sure that somewhere there is a heartbroken owner wondering about his/her pet. I called the transit police and they told me the cat was taken to the ASPCA, presumably to their hospital up on E. 62nd Street in Manhattan.

Maybe if you publicize this incident the owner will find out what has happened to the cat. I hope so. I don’t know the full extent of its injuries but even if it could not be saved, the owners would prefer to have some closure, I am sure.