A parking garage collapsed on Tuesday in the Financial District in lower Manhattan, killing one worker, injuring five and crushing cars as concrete floors fell on top of each other like a stack of pancakes, officials said.
Police said they had no reason to believe the incident was anything other than a structural collapse.
Bystander video showed cars hanging precariously from a buckled upper deck of the three-story building. People nearby described a fearsome rumbling followed by screams.
“It felt like an earthquake,” said Liam Gaeta, a student at nearby Pace University. Other students described seeing cars falling in the building.
Officials said one worker was trapped on an upper floor before being rescued via a neighboring roof.
The garage caved in at around 4pm, a few blocks from city hall and the Brooklyn Bridge and about half a mile from the New York Stock Exchange.
The collapse left the building “completely unstable”, the mayor, Eric Adams, told reporters. Firefighters had to pull out because of the danger, instead conducting searches with a drone and a robotic dog, said the fire department chief of operations, John Esposito.
The building was “all the way pancaked, collapsed all the way to the cellar floor”, said Kazimir Vilenchik, the acting buildings commissioner.
William Flashnick, 19, was in a Pace classroom when he and a friend thought they heard an explosion and ran to a window to look.
As they opened the window, a plume of thick dust rose in the air. When it cleared, they peered down into the parking lot, where cars lay tossed around and a top parking deck had cracked open. Video footage from the scene cited by CBS and ABC affiliates showed the rescue operation getting under way amid crumpled concrete.
Flashnick said one of his first thoughts was of the World Trade Center, which loomed over the neighborhood before the attacks of 11 September 2001 in which more than 3,000 people were killed.
“We freaked out. Given the history of this place, it’s a little scary,” Flasnick said.
