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A bizarre crisis is unfolding in New York City as the site of a high-rise construction project has reportedly become unstable and triggered nearby evacuations.
The building, located in Manhattan, formerly served as the former headquarters for Big Pharma giant Pfizer, multiple outlets have reported.
According to the New York City Fire Department, the agency began receiving reports Tuesday morning about a “structural issue” at the site of this building, which is being converted from a commercial office building into a residential complex.
Officials responded to the situation and assessed structural issues on the 21st floor, the FDNY said, finding two structural columns “buckled” along with “multiple cracks and sagging floors.”
“It’s a very serious situation because the box beams—the steel beams—have started to bend and deflect from the weight,” Chief of Department John Esposito said in a statement. “We evacuated the building and started evacuations of surrounding buildings. The building has continued to move since we have been on the scene.”
According to Fox News, multiple bricks were reportedly seen falling from the building.
Far-left New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani told reporters of the evolving crisis, “This is an extremely serious situation.”
He said the building “remains unstable” and noted that the areas between 40th and 45th Streets, as well as the area between First and Third Avenues, were a “frozen zone.”
An online video posted by ABC7NY appeared to show the interior of the Manhattan building. The video seemed to show multiple bent steel beams. A construction worker on-site observed to reporters that the renovation underway in the building required the addition of “more steel, and they obviously didn’t add the right amount of steel.”
He described the north side of the building as “crumbling” with the beams “bending like cigarettes.”
New York City Comptroller Mark D. Levine said on X that the high-rise was “at risk of a localized collapse due to two structural (load-bearing) columns buckling on the 21st floor. There are also multiple cracks and sagging floors. The building remains unstable, and city officials have witnessed continued movement of the building since around 8am this morning aided by the use of FDNY drones.”
Levine confirmed that everyone in the building had been evacuated and accounted for.