Falling step from SoHo fire escape critically injures two people
A pair of unsuspecting SoHo pedestrians were critically injured Friday when a 150-pound metal fire escape step plunged seven stories onto their heads, officials said.
“The girl wasn’t moving,” eyewitness Imola Kobar, 41, told the Daily News. “It was just horrible. Their heads were just smashed on the ground.”
The two unlucky victims, both bleeding from horrific gashes to their heads, were rushed to Bellevue Hospital with life-threatening injuries.
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Several pieces fell to the sidewalk, hitting three people below, sources said.
“There was blood all over them and all over the street,” said Radhamas Morales, 43, of the Bronx. “People were screaming … The older man was lying in the street. He was not even moving.
“Even when the firemen were there checking him, he was showing no sign of being alive.”
A third person was treated for lesser injuries at the scene, officials said.
A pool of blood on the street after a piece of fire escape fell seven stories down and struck two pedestrians.
The 4-foot-by-6-inch metal step broke loose and dropped toward the sidewalk as a contractor inspecting the building’s facade stepped onto the fire escape, said FDNY Assistant Borough Commander Michael Gala.
The contractor fell partially through the spot left vacant by the missing step but was able to pull herself back to safety, according to Gala. She declined medical attention.
A source at the scene said the step weighed roughly 150 pounds. “It’s a big hunk of metal,” the source told The News.
The fire escape collapsed on the seventh floor of the building on Howard St.
Kobar said she was walking north on Broadway around 1:30 p.m. when she heard the metallic sounds of the piece breaking free of the fire escape on Howard St.
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