Tragic MRI Incident: What Really Happened to Keith McAllister?

A 61-year-old man died after he was pulled into an MRI machine by the powerful magnetic force of the scanner while wearing a heavy weight training chain around his neck. The incident occurred in the afternoon of July 16, 2025, at Nassau Open MRI in Westbury while a scan was underway. Police said the man entered the MRI room wearing a metallic chain around his neck, and the machine's magnetic force drew him in by the chain. He died the following afternoon, according to the Nassau County Police Department . A police officer at the precinct where the MRI facility is located initially said the department had not yet been given permission to release his name. However, his wife identified him as Keith McAllister during an interview with News 12 Long Island. Wife recalls terrifying moments inside MRI room Adrienne Jones-McAllister told News 12 Long Island that she was having an MRI on her knee when she asked the technician to get her husband to help her off the table. She said the technician called him into the room while he was wearing a 20-pound chain that he used for weight training. Jones-McAllister said they had even spoken about the chain during an earlier visit, recalling comments such as: "Ooooooh, that's a big chain!" When her husband approached, she said, "at that instant, the machine switched him around, pulled him in and he hit the MRI." Keith McAllister. Credit: GoFundMe She described desperately pleading for help as the situation unfolded. "I said: 'Could you turn off the machine, call 911, do something, Turn this damn thing off!'" she recalled, as tears ran down her face. "He went limp in my arms." Jones-McAllister said the technician tried to help pull her husband away from the machine, but it was impossible. "He waved goodbye to me and then his whole body went limp," Jones-McAllister told the outlet. She also said McAllister suffered heart attacks after he was freed from the MRI machine. Powerful magnets can turn metal objects into deadly hazards The incident was not the first fatal MRI-related accident in New York. In 2001, six-year-old Michael Colombini of Croton-on-Hudson was killed at Westchester Medical Center after an oxygen tank was pulled into the MRI chamber by the machine's 10 ton electromagnet. Court records later showed the family settled a lawsuit for $2.9 million in 2010. According to the National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering, MRI machines "employ a strong magnetic field" that "exerts very powerful forces on objects of iron, some steels, and other magnetizable objects." The agency says the magnets are "strong enough to fling a wheelchair across the room." Featured image credit: GoFundMe