Would you have walked in an MRI to help your partner? He did—and never walked out
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Content warning: This story contains details of a fatal incident involving medical equipment.
It was meant to be a routine MRI appointment—but it ended in unimaginable tragedy.
Keith McAllister was just steps away from his wife when an invisible force ripped him into the machine.
What happened next has left a family broken and a state demanding answers.
Adrienne Jones-McAllister had been lying on the MRI table for a knee scan at Nassau Open MRI in Long Island when she asked staff to bring in her husband to help her stand.
As 61-year-old Keith McAllister entered the room on 17 July 2025, the MRI machine’s powerful magnetic field latched onto the heavy chain necklace he always wore—dragging him violently across the room.
The necklace, which reportedly weighed close to 500 grams, was pulled so forcefully that McAllister was hurled into the imaging device, falling limp into his wife’s arms.
‘He went limp in my arms,’ Jones-McAllister said.
‘This is still pulsating in my brain.’
She said she screamed at staff to turn off the machine and call emergency services.
Although help arrived quickly and McAllister was rushed to hospital, he suffered multiple heart attacks and died the following day.
His wife said the necklace was no surprise to staff.
‘That was not the first time that guy has seen that chain,’ she claimed.
‘They had a conversation about it before—casual comments like, “Ooooooh, that’s a big chain!”’
The incident has prompted a review by the New York Department of Health, which noted that MRI facilities in the state are not routinely inspected due to their classification outside regulated diagnostic and treatment centres.
MRI machines are never fully powered down and can turn metallic objects—even small ones—into dangerous projectiles.
Dr Payal Sud of North Shore University Hospital said a chain of that size could cause ‘strangulation injuries, asphyxiation, cervical spine injuries’.
Charles Winterfeldt, director of imaging services at the same hospital, described such an object inside an MRI room as a ‘torpedo’.
Experts and advocates are now calling for clearer safety protocols to prevent similar tragedies, particularly regarding who is allowed inside MRI suites and what items are permitted.
It’s hard to imagine that something designed to diagnose could end up causing harm—but as we’ve just seen, safety isn’t always guaranteed in medical settings.
While Keith’s story involved a tragic accident inside an MRI room, there are growing concerns about the risks tied to another common scan.
A recent report has raised serious questions about whether this everyday medical test might actually be doing more harm than good.
Read more: Is this standard medical test doing more harm than good? Here's what a study says
Losing a loved one to a preventable accident in a medical facility is a tragedy no family should ever face.
It was meant to be a routine MRI appointment—but it ended in unimaginable tragedy.
Keith McAllister was just steps away from his wife when an invisible force ripped him into the machine.
What happened next has left a family broken and a state demanding answers.
Adrienne Jones-McAllister had been lying on the MRI table for a knee scan at Nassau Open MRI in Long Island when she asked staff to bring in her husband to help her stand.
As 61-year-old Keith McAllister entered the room on 17 July 2025, the MRI machine’s powerful magnetic field latched onto the heavy chain necklace he always wore—dragging him violently across the room.
The necklace, which reportedly weighed close to 500 grams, was pulled so forcefully that McAllister was hurled into the imaging device, falling limp into his wife’s arms.
Chain yanked by MRI in fatal accident. Image source: Facebook/Samantha Bodden
‘He went limp in my arms,’ Jones-McAllister said.
‘This is still pulsating in my brain.’
She said she screamed at staff to turn off the machine and call emergency services.
Although help arrived quickly and McAllister was rushed to hospital, he suffered multiple heart attacks and died the following day.
His wife said the necklace was no surprise to staff.
‘That was not the first time that guy has seen that chain,’ she claimed.
‘They had a conversation about it before—casual comments like, “Ooooooh, that’s a big chain!”’
The incident has prompted a review by the New York Department of Health, which noted that MRI facilities in the state are not routinely inspected due to their classification outside regulated diagnostic and treatment centres.
MRI machines are never fully powered down and can turn metallic objects—even small ones—into dangerous projectiles.
Dr Payal Sud of North Shore University Hospital said a chain of that size could cause ‘strangulation injuries, asphyxiation, cervical spine injuries’.
Charles Winterfeldt, director of imaging services at the same hospital, described such an object inside an MRI room as a ‘torpedo’.
Experts and advocates are now calling for clearer safety protocols to prevent similar tragedies, particularly regarding who is allowed inside MRI suites and what items are permitted.
It’s hard to imagine that something designed to diagnose could end up causing harm—but as we’ve just seen, safety isn’t always guaranteed in medical settings.
While Keith’s story involved a tragic accident inside an MRI room, there are growing concerns about the risks tied to another common scan.
A recent report has raised serious questions about whether this everyday medical test might actually be doing more harm than good.
Read more: Is this standard medical test doing more harm than good? Here's what a study says
Losing a loved one to a preventable accident in a medical facility is a tragedy no family should ever face.
