MIDTOWN EAST, Manhattan (WABC) — The effort to stabilize an under-construction high-rise in Midtown Manhattan on Tuesday is expected to last “into the night,” keeping streets shut down and buildings evacuated, officials said.
A city official said a team that was sent in late Tuesday afternoon has completed their initial assessment and contractors can now move forward with the installation of temporary shoring to stabilize the building.
It all started when a structural column buckled on the 21st floor, and additional structural issues were subsequently discovered, Mayor Zohran Mamdani said.
“The building remains unstable,” Mamdani said during a news conference Tuesday afternoon, as there had been additional movement in one of the columns since city officials arrived. “This is an extremely serious situation.”
The high-rise at 235 E. 42nd St., on the corner of East 42nd Street and Second Avenue, is a 1970s-era office building being converted into luxury apartments. The former global headquarters of pharmaceutical giant Pfizer is located in a busy corridor about a block from the landmark Chrysler Building and between Grand Central Terminal and the United Nations headquarters.
Around 8 a.m., construction workers noticed cracks inside the building. The FDNY say the workers spotted structural support columns beginning to buckle on the 21st and 22nd floors and self-evacuated.
Officials say that caused the 21st to 26th floors of the 37-story building to start caving under the stress.
An image from inside the building shows a buckling column.
A nearby school with about 400 children was among the multiple evacuated buildings, Mamdani said at a press conference.
Fire Department Chief John Esposito added that the building continued to move hours later as emergency officials arrived on scene. Nearby streets were closed to people and vehicles.
Video shows the interior of an unstable building that sparked evacuations in Midtown on Tuesday.
Structural engineers are monitoring the building’s movement from the outside. A team of six entered the building to assess the structure and determine if shoring efforts are safe to begin.
The team took the elevator to the 17th floor and then walked floor by floor, at last check reaching the 31st floor. By 4:30 p.m., city officials said there had been no additional movement of the damaged columns.
The city is using highly sensitive equipment that can measure the smallest of movements.
Officials address concerns around a buckling building in Midtown.
Buckling columns and some bad “floor conditions” were spotted by buildings department inspectors.
Esposito said the steel columns have begun to “bend and deflect.”
If the building were to give way, it would “not be a total collapse, it would be more of a localized collapse,” Esposito added.
Every worker is accounted for, and no injuries have been reported, police say.
The building is topped out at 37 floors, and as more infrastructure was added to the floors above the 21st floor, the load-bearing columns became more stressed, officials say.
The building has not moved in several hours, Deputy Mayor for Housing and Development Leila Bozorg said around 4 p.m., a hopeful sign. However, she suggested this would not be a quick operation but a painstaking one to assure safety.
A frozen zone has been established in the area, closing streets off to both pedestrians and vehicular traffic.
Building evacuations and street closures
The FDNY said the following buildings have been evacuated:
Of the evacuated buildings, 231 East 43rd Street is the Hampton Inn Manhattan Grand Central, and guests have been evacuated from their rooms.
Additionally, 225 East 43rd Street is the Kennedy International School. The school was running a summer camp for 400 children in Pre-K through 5th grade this week.
The Israeli Consulate at 800 Second Avenue was also evacuated “as a precaution.”
The current frozen zone is set up from First and Third avenues between 40th and 45th Streets. Those streets are closed to both pedestrian and vehicular traffic.
Mamdani said those who live or work in the frozen zone will get updates.
Previous building violations
The unstable building has seven violations between July and December 2025, resulting in more than $32,000 in fines issued.
There are at least 22 violations that date back to 2020.
Metro Loft, the developer of the conversion project, released a statement saying, “We are working closely with the Department of Buildings to understand the full scope of the situation. The safety of our workers and the public has always been, and remains, our top priority.”
The cause of the instability will be determined after the emergency trusses are in place, according to the buildings commissioner.
Dan Krauth has the details from the newsroom.
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