New York unstable building: Several buildings evacuated as officials warn of possible collapse due to buckling beams in high-rise

NEW YORK (WPVI) — Several floors of a Midtown Manhattan office building that’s under construction are caving in on Tuesday, prompting the evacuation of several adjacent buildings and street closures.

Officials said they are working to make sure the building and surrounding structures are safe.

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 has been additional movement in one of the columns since city officials arrived.

The high-rise, at 235 E. 42nd St., is on the corner of East 42nd Street and Second Avenue and is the former headquarters of the Pfizer pharmaceutical company and is under conversion to residential use.

Around 8 a.m., construction workers noticed cracks inside the building. The FDNY say the workers spotted structural support beams beginning to buckle on the 21st and 22nd floors and self-evacuated.

Officials say that caused the 21st to 26th floors of the building to start caving under the stress.

Multiple buildings have been evacuated, including a hotel and a school, and work is now underway to stabilize the building.

Structural engineers are monitoring movement of the building from the outside. Once it’s deemed safe to enter they will begin shoring up the building with emergency trusses.

The city is using highly sensitive equipment that can measure the smallest of movement and the column’s movement is a concern.

“It does mean that it is not yet stable, it is still a very serious and dangerous situation,” Department of Buildings Commissioner Ahmed Tigani added.

Buckling beams and some bad “floor conditions” were spotted by buildings department inspectors.

The steel beams have begun to “bend and deflect,” Chief of Fire Department John Esposito said.

If the building were to give way, it would “not be a total collapse, it would be more of a localized collapse,” Esposito added.

No injuries have been reported and all workers are accounted for.

The building is topped out at 37 floors and as more infrastructure was added to the floors above the 21st floors, the load-baring columns became more stressed, officials say.

The current “frozen zone” is from First and Third avenues, from 40th to 45th Streets.

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 out of their rooms.

Additionally, 225 East 43rd Street is the Kennedy International School, a lower school of elementary-aged students.

Pedestrian and vehicular traffic is closed on East 42nd Street between Second and Third avenues.

Second Avenue is closed from 38th to 44th streets and 43rd and 44th streets are closed between Second and Third avenues.

The unstable building has seven violations between July and December 2025, resulting with more than $32,000 in fines issued.

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.

The 38-story building is currently the largest office to apartment conversion in city history.

When completed, the building will house 1,600 apartments, including over 400 affordable housing units.

The investigation remains ongoing.