Midtown Manhattan tower evacuated due to structural failures during renovation

[bigpicture7]

Credit to @Arenacale for initially posting on this in the general NYC thread. A quite unfortunate and dangerous situation unfolding.

https://pix11.com/news/columns-buckle-at-midtown-building-fdny/

^from above:

https://www.nytimes.com/live/2026/07/07/nyregion/pfizer-building-midtown-collapse

Midtown Manhattan buildings evacuated after beams found buckling at high-rise construction site

Mayor Mamdani says "the building remains unstable" as there has been additional movement in one of the columns since city officials arrived.

abc7ny.com

^from above:

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 26st floors of the 37-story 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.

 

[FormFollowsBudget]

How do you even safely shore that?

 

[Arenacale]

You don't. I think they're waiting to see if it stabilizes and then try to come up with a demo plan.

The video from inside is pretty shocking, those guys should have spent more time getting out of there and less time getting photos. Lucky this hasn't yet turned into a Hard Rock New Orleans situation.

 

[Stlin]

https://twitter.com/x/status/2074543873049629024

From the FDNY who put up a drone. If I've got the spot right, this is where the buildings horizontal addition starts to expand the towers floorplates, thus these buckling columns are immediately beneath the additional 15 stories. I would presume that this collapse is where they were (presumably) tying into the existing buildings structure - I can't find actual plans or permits since NYC DOBs websites are a confusing morass, but even if this is fixable this is gonna be a popcorn worthy liability conundrum. Below photos from CCM, the contractors and NY YIMBY.

 

[stick n move]

This is what the new building was supposed to look like.

Link

Link

Old building with the old facade.

Some pictures of the recent additions, most of the tower has also been reclad. The back side of the tower is where they filled in more of the building and added a lot of floors.

The backside where the previous cut out in the building has been filled in on the right. This is the problem area.

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/07/07/nyregion/office-residential-explainer-faq.html

 

[stick n move]

This guy does a good job explaining

View this content on Instagram

View this content on Instagram

 

[393b40]

Someone didn't do the math right...

 

[Equilibria]

Someone didn't do the math right...

I'm guessing that someone was AI.

 

[bigpicture7]

I'm guessing that someone was AI.

No idea (at this point, from this vantage) whether or not that was the case here, but, more generally speaking with regard to engineering: I suspect society will soon learn that there's one thing AI will never be able to do as well as human engineers: being a satisfying receptacle for blame. Once that becomes more fully realized -- and it will inevitably become realized -- AI will be used (when it's used) more as a tool and less as a crutch.

 

[bigpicture7]

How do you even safely shore that?

Like this apparently:

^From ABC News:

Manhattan streets begin to reopen as crews stabilize compromised high-rise building

New York City officials began to reopen some streets and buildings Wednesday, after engineering crews stabilized a building that was at risk of collapse.

abcnews.com

The best before/after shot (slider-bar comparison viewer) I've seen that depicts the state of the building's addition is via this CNN article:

https://www.cnn.com/2026/07/09/us/nyc-building-stabilized-what-next

There were at least two primary structural columns that severely buckled, as shown in this video (allow it to pan left/right):

View this content on Instagram

View this content on Instagram

^via NBC-4 NYC:

New photos show inside 21st floor of buckling Manhattan high-rise

New photos shared by the Department of Buildings Wednesday offer the clearest look yet at the buckling 21st-floor beams of the under-construction Manhattan high-rise that triggered a huge emergency response and mass evacuations a day prior. The agency and the mayor’s office say the building...

www.nbcnewyork.com

 

[393b40]

Wonder what the hazard pay is to go into a structure that is basically on the verge of collapse and shore it up is like.

 

[Charlie_mta]

No idea (at this point, from this vantage) whether or not that was the case here, but, more generally speaking with regard to engineering: I suspect society will soon learn that there's one thing AI will never be able to do as well as human engineers: being a satisfying receptacle for blame. Once that becomes more fully realized -- and it will inevitably become realized -- AI will be used (when it's used) more as a tool and less as a crutch.

I majored in structural engineering as a civil engineering undergrad, and the thought of AI doing the structural design on buildings of this size is unsettling (no pun intended) to say the least. There's a lot of human judgement, experience, and intuition that go into a structural design. The rote machinations performed by AI are woefully incomplete.