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Midtown Manhattan blocks evacuated after beams buckling at construction site
- gorjusborg 2mo agoDoes anyone here have any knowledge of how something like this gets resolved?
- SilverElfin 2mo agoGiven all the bad press around things like the millennium tower, I think once you have an issue like this, the building is done. No one will want to live there. And given structural problems with load bearing beams, I would expect the building has to be demolished. But maybe they can demolish it top down partially and rebuild up from the compromised area if the city and engineers deem that safe.
- fiatpandas 2mo agoKnocking down a building like this will be a huge pain, extremely expensive, and very dangerous. I think you can assume the developers will try desperately to retrofit the building before demo. There’s good precedence for this even in New York City. Look into the Citicorp case study.
- ErroneousBosh 2mo agoTie every helicopter you can find to the roof, gas the bent bit off, haul it away and drop it somewhere? They'll likely shore it up with hydraulic props - probably going through the floor and ceiling to floor slabs above and below - to stabilise it, and then start demolishing the building bit by bit.
- kylehotchkiss 2mo agoWhen you run the mental model of picking up a building with a bunch of surplus Hueys, do they not all collide together once they start bearing weight?
- ErroneousBosh 2mo agoNot if you make the strings different lengths.
- hagbard_c 2mo agoIn that case the helicopters lower in the pecking order will chop off the strings for the higher ones. I thing seagulls is a better idea, if it worked for a giant peach it should work for a building. Plenty of those around and they'll work for peanuts.
- tonyedgecombe 2mo agoBalloons should do it.
- singleshot_ 2mo ago“spreader bar”
- ErroneousBosh 2mo agoBut not one made out of the same stuff as those beams, they're like chocolate.
- Anon1096 2mo agoMost likely the building gets stabilized and then anyone involved gets embroiled in lawsuits and it stays standing half finished for years. One Seaport is a famous recent example of an under construction skyscraper getting halted for structural issues. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/161_Maiden_Lane https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/161_Maiden_Lane
- IAmBroom 2mo agoAs flatpandas[0] points out, this might in fact be the best possible practical outcome. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48820971 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48820971
- dlcarrier 2mo agoThey have something like that in San Francisco (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/301_Mission_Street https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/301_Mission_Street) but they key to finishing it is to not tell anyone it's crooked until after you've sold all of the units.
- onlypassingthru 2mo agoYes, sometimes gravity resolves the problem for you.
- danofsteel32 2mo agoThis is a little pedantic but the pictures seem to show failing support columns not beams. Beams are horizontal and columns are vertical.
- pram 2mo agoI'm not an expert but those look like pretty wimpy columns? Kind of surprising, when I worked in a tower it had exposed concrete columns that were very thick in comparison
- rcxdude 2mo agoI think the first picture is not showing structural columns: they're more a symptom (buckling as the building is moving) as opposed to the cause.
- mrguyorama 2mo agoAs the sibling says, that first picture shows essentially interior wall framing. They shouldn't really be seeing any load! They are buckling because the floors and ceilings are bending! Scroll down and there is a picture of a much thicker support pillar, though still seems thin? Maybe just the context in frame doesn't do it justice.
- kylehotchkiss 2mo agoThe USA is mostly empty space. Trying to force upwards in such an already dense area just doesn't make sense. We are not constrained the way singapore is.
- ChrisLTD 2mo agoIt's illegal to build dense cities like Manhattan in most of the United States. And while most people want to live in a Manhattan'esque area, plenty (like me) do.
- DHPersonal 2mo agoSpreading out requires more non-foot travel to get places. Density means things can be closer.
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- ChrisArchitect 2mo agoNYT updates (non-paywall) https://www.nytimes.com/live/2026/07/07/nyregion/pfizer-building-midtown-collapse?unlocked_article_code=1.v1A.KOot.KXDEA_ku4Pzt&smid=url-share https://www.nytimes.com/live/2026/07/07/nyregion/pfizer-buil...
- comrade1234 2mo agoThey're adding a hunch of floors to an existing building - it was the old Pfizer headquarters and they want to turn it into apartments. Someone either didn't do the proper engineering study, or the original specs weren't accurate. Figuring out who to blame will probably take years in court.
- dlcarrier 2mo agoMore often than a faulty initial design, it's because of a something not being followed, e.g. the design called for one type of material or process and another was used during construction, either on accident or on purpose but without correctly doing the math to verify that it will work.
- dehrmann 2mo agoThis makes a case for engineering margins, maybe even running the numbers assuming a worse grade of steel or bolts than specified. Also worth remembering this building wasn't special. If this was a design or construction flaw that surfaced with added load, a lot of other buildings from that era probably have a similar issue.
- asdefghyk 2mo agoCould also be incorrect materials used. than specified? Fake parts? or construction , used that not obvious
- cromka 2mo agoHaving seen the photos, I simply can't imagine how can they recover from that.
- archonis 2mo agoI wonder if Metroloft cut corners on structural engineering practices given that they also exploit non-union workers.
- Krypto26 2mo agoYou mean they are buckling even without the benefit of being struck with an aircraft or thousands of gallons of burning jet fuel?
- fmajid 2mo agoThere was the Citibank headquarters https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1995/05/29/the-fifty-nine-story-crisis-citicorp-center https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1995/05/29/the-fifty-nine...
- deleted 2mo ago[deleted]