A taxi driver was clinging to life after a medical emergency caused him to lose control of his yellow cab and slam into a light pole outside the Chinese Consulate in Manhattan on Thursday, law enforcement sources said.
The cab driver was heading west on W. 42nd St. when he lost control of his taxi, mounted the curb and smashed into a light pole at the corner of 12th Ave. around 2:27 p.m., cops said.
Also in the taxi was a 61-year-old man and a 54-year-old woman, both of whom suffered minor injuries in the crash, said police.
A 33-year-old male pedestrian was also injured in the crash. Paramedics rushed the pedestrian, the two passengers and the critically injured cab driver to Bellevue Hospital for treatment, cops said.
A Queens man working at the nearby Javits Center for Comic Con rushed to the scene after hearing the crash, and helped pull the injured passengers from the cab.
“It was a loud crash. The cab was still smoking,” said the 33-year-old Queens man about the two backseat passengers. “I helped get the guy out of the back and put him in the stretcher. His head was under the passenger seat on the right side. She had a huge gash on her face. She was pretty banged up.”
“The driver was engulfed by the air bags. His face was smashed completely into the steering wheel he was totally unresponsive. It was a crazy.”
An MTA bus driver told a Daily News reporter at the scene that rescuers had to use a hydraulic rescue tool known as the Jaws of Life to extract one of the men from the taxi.
“I saw them take someone out,” the bus driver said. “He was trapped. They had to use the Jaws of Life. He looked like he was in bad shape.”
The crash occurred just steps away from the southwest corner of the Consulate General of the People’s Republic of China in New York, which former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo called a “spy hub” in 2020 following the arrest of NYPD officer Baimadajie Angwang for espionage.
Angwang was arrested in September 2020 and spent roughly six months in Brooklyn’s Metropolitan Detention Center, much of that time in solitary confinement after federal prosecutors accused him of spying on Tibetan communities for the Chinese government.
A federal judge would drop all charges against Angwang in 2023, but the scandal would ultimately cost the officer his job at the NYPD, with Commissioner Edward Caban firing him in 2024 for failing to submit to questioning by internal affairs investigators about the spying case.
