L Train Fumes Leave Pregnant Woman Too Sick To Take Subway

WILLIAMSBURG, BROOKLYN — The first time Jeanna Kolson Holmes noticed a mysterious gas smell during her commute on the L train Monday night, she brushed it off. Maybe being seven months pregnant had made her sense of smell especially sensitive, the Greenpoint resident thought.

Even when she began feeling ill after arriving home — to the point where she had to pull up a chair to finish cooking dinner because she was unable to stand — Holmes thought it was unusual, but moved on.

It wasn't until after another two days of her regular L-line commute from Metropolitan Ave. to Jefferson Ave. that Holmes noticed something was seriously wrong.

"I had to rush off the train (Wednesday night) to make it home to lay down so that I wouldn't faint," she said.

At that point, she decided to swear off the L train to avoid the stench. She has felt completely fine since not taking the train for the last two days, she said.

Holmes is one of many L-train regulars sickened this week by a gassy stench that first appeared on the subway line Monday. MTA officials, who briefly shut down the line to investigate Tuesday, have said it's caused by leaked heating oil at the Graham Avenue station.

The agency maintains that, despite complaints from passengers like Holmes and at least four MTA workers who were sent to the hospital, the air quality is safe. The non-flammable heating oil, which the Daily News reports might be from a defunct gas station in Bushwick, has since been cleaned up.

MTA officials most recently released a report by an independent consulting firm hired to test the air, which found the "volatile organic compounds" in the air were at zero in four Brooklyn stations.

But riders like Holmes are unconvinced.

"I have lived in the city for quite some time and am not someone who is easily ruffled by New York smells," Holmes said, adding that this is the first time she's felt the need to complain to the MTA.

"I also do not get sick easily," she added. "Something is not adding up with their story."

The transit workers union is also unsatisfied with how transit officials handled the situation. The union has pulled several workers from the subway line and will continue to do so if the smell isn't gone over the weekend, TWU Local 100 President Tony Utano said.

Holmes said she did appreciate the MTA reaching out to her complaints on Twitter to ask if she needed medical assistance, but said their later suggestion that she take buses to avoid the L seemed untenable.

She worried about being pregnant and standing outside waiting for multiple bus transfers in the elements, she said. Instead, she has been forced to take an Uber or Lyft to work the past two days — an extra $45 so far even with the shared Lyfts option.

Holmes said she will keep taking Ubers and Lyfts until she can get more answers from the MTA. The independent report doesn't seem to align with what riders are experiencing and she believes a second opinion is needed.

"There has to be an explanation as to why multiple people are getting sick," Holmes said. "The test conclusion is just not lining up."

Photo provided by Jeanna Kolson Holmes of herself, second photo by Anna Quinn/Patch.