A man on a MARTA bridge doused himself in gasoline and threatened to set himself on fire Monday morning, but police and firefighters were able to get him down uninjured.
“He was on one of the support beams for the bridge at Inman Park station,” said Alisa Jackson, MARTA spokeswoman.
The unidentified man had climbed a pole near the south bus loop at 1055 DeKalb Ave. NE, and was sitting on top of the bridge when emergency crews arrived.
Negotiators talked with him about an hour and a half before police and firefighters used other tactics to force the man down. He set fire to a bucket of gasoline he was holding but that fire quickly went out, according to Glen Riley, battalion chief for the fire department. Firefighters were prepared for him setting a larger fire, Riley said.
They finally forced the man to jump or fall into an airbag they had set up below. “It was a combination of water cannons and bean bags that finally got him down from up there,” Riley said.
The man was taken to Grady Memorial Hospital for evaluation, police said.
“We wanted to make sure that he landed safely, and we hope that our law enforcement will continue to work together through situations like this,” Jackson said.
Train service was not interrupted, but some buses were re-routed to another area of the station as the drama occurred.
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