Golden Gate Bridge patrol officer uses grabber to save cellphone in viral video

Onlookers held their breath for more than a minute before letting out a cheer in a viral TikTok video showing a Golden Gate Bridge patrol officer using a grabbing tool to retrieve a dropped cellphone.

The post has been viewed over 13 million times.

The bridge patrol officer, identified as Fabien Benjamin, told SFGate that it’s all part of the job.

According to Benjamin, a tourist alerted him that their phone had fallen over the edge of the bridge and landed on the ledge a few feet away.

Every patrol officer is trained with grabber tools for occasions such as the one recorded on Sunday, Benjamin told SFGate. In fact, all Golden Gate Bridge Highway and Transportation District vehicles stock a grabber tool, and there’s even extra-long grabbers stored in the bridge’s south tower, It was one of those extra-long grabbers that Fabian used in the video, he said.

Most items, including phones, hats and wallets, blow away in the strong winds that whip across the bridge, and retrievals are a relatively common occurrence, Benjamin said.