Man commits suicide on Cairo metro

A man committed suicide on Tuesday by jumping off a metro platform as a train arrived, a metro spokesman has said.
 
Mohamed Abdel Maksoud, 45, was waiting on the pavement before he rushed to throw himself on the rails as a train streamed into a station in central Cairo, Ahmed Abdel-Hady, spokesman for Egyptian Company for Metro Management and Operation (ECMMO), told Ahram Online, citing eyewitnesses.
 
The man's head was crushed and he died immediately, the spokesperson added.
 
The accident at the Gamal Abdel-Nasser station disrupted train movement for ten minutes until the body was lifted off the rail.
 
The incident is the latest in a series of suicides reported in Egypt in recent months, with some reportedly motivated by economic hardship or extreme depression.
 
In November 2014, a 22-year-old female activist, Zeinab Al-Mahdy, hung herself at her home in Cairo after what her friends said was a months-long bout of depression, partly due to the political situation, leaving a suicide note to her family.
 
In September, a man died after he hung himself from a billboard on a motorway connecting Cairo to the country's north.