The 36th Street train station cameras in Sunset Park, Brooklyn, failed to capture the incident taking place inside on April 12. Even though most have cell phones, it is essential for the Metropolitan Transportation Authority to ensure that all security cameras in every subway station are functional.

The MTA has opened an investigation into the failed security cameras and New York City Mayor Eric Adams said there was a problem with the camera system at the subway station where the shooting occurred.

“We’re not sure if it was a video feed problem,” Adams said, according to PIX11. “If there’s a problem, it must be immediately repaired.”

For criminal investigations, the subway station’s cameras provide live footage of incidents, such as the shooting, to the MTA’s security center. As of September 2021, all subway stations were equipped with cameras.

However, the failure of the cameras is one that MTA officials knew about previously according to state officials’ inspections in 2018 and 2019.

“In a pair of inspections from 2018 and 2019 reviewed by CBS News, state officials warned New York City’s Metropolitan Transportation Authority that its subway system’s security cameras were at risk of malfunctions. They found that the MTA failed to ensure preventative maintenance and timely repairs on thousands of the cameras,” CBS News reported.

Following this incident, the MTA system and state officials should work together to ensure that cameras in all subway stations are working.