The building at the center of this week’s Midtown scare is the former Pfizer world headquarters at 235 East 42nd Street: a 33-story tower built in 1960 that, alongside its neighbor at 219 East 42nd, is being converted by Metro Loft and David Werner Real Estate Investments into roughly 1,600 apartments, the largest office-to-residential conversion in U.S. history.
On Tuesday morning, the FDNY received reports of bricks falling from the building; inspectors found two support columns buckling on the 21st floor and floors sagging up through the 26th. Nine surrounding buildings were evacuated, a “frozen zone” was established from First to Third Avenues, and by Tuesday night, crews had begun installing emergency shoring. No injuries were reported. Metro Loft’s Nathan Berman attributed the buckling to added weight from new floors; while the site had racked up seven DOB violations and roughly $15,000 in fines over the past year for falling debris.
Forensic and structural engineer Joseph Di Pompeo, who has more than 25 years of experience in structural engineering and forensic investigation and has testified as an expert witness before planning and zoning boards, and in New Jersey and New York state and federal courts, said the type of failure visible in photos and video doesn’t support a steel-quality explanation—which is what the FDNY first said at a press conference yesterday.
