Crew to fix Massapequa station escalator

An escalator ground to a screeching halt at the Massapequa train station Friday morning, startling customers who had just left the escalator and walked onto the station platform.

"We had just stepped off and there was a loud bang, like an explosion," said Phil Cincotta, 60, who was headed for the 6:01 a.m. train to Penn Station.

"The escalator ground into itself, a mound of steel at the top, as the stairs ground into each other, bunching up, collapsing on top of each other. I've never seen anything like this," said Cincotta, an admissions director at New Horizons Computer Learning Center in Manhattan and a 25-year resident of Massapequa.

"Everyone was saying to us, 'This was your lucky day.' It's amazing no one was killed."

Some stairs on the escalator stopped moving, causing the steps behind it to bunch up, said railroad spokesman Sam Zambuto. He said the escalator was "quickly cordoned off."

"There were no reported injuries," he said. "It's very fortunate that at that point, someone was not on the escalator."

Zambuto said the incident is under investigation. He said the exact cause of the problem was not known, but it did not appear the escalator was vandalized.

He said a contractor was working to fix the escalator, which is at the east end of the platform.

It was not immediately clear how long it would take to return the escalator to service.

Cincotta, who said he has been taking the Long Island Rail Road out of Massapequa for about seven years, said he and a had friend stepped off the escalator at 6 a.m. when the stairs behind him "ground to a halt" in an earsplitting malfunction.