Didn’t realize conductors go under the trains

Was riding the spring valley line and got off at River edge , and the conductor that was in our train was helping a broken train out . He was under it tying together what looked like
Huge wires or hoses maybe. I thought they had people who did that only for a living, had no idea the ticket people were allowed to do that or if it’s even safe.

Took a few min but they connected the train and went backwards , not sure where they were headed but they at least got the broken train out of the way.

Do conductors always do this ? Whatever the 745 out of Secaucus