NEW YORK (1010 WINS/WCBS 880) – A seven-story building in the Bronx partially collapsed on Monday afternoon, but miraculously no one was seriously injured, officials said.
The FDNY received a call around 4 p.m. about the collapse at the building located at 1915 Billingsley Terrace in Morris Heights, which has 47 residential units and six businesses.
Citizen App video showed a corner of the building had collapsed onto the sidewalk. Security camera video obtained by several news organizations showed people scattering off the sidewalk as debris rained down in a billowing cloud of dust.
Witnesses described seeing the side of the building slowly collapsing, leaving a 12-foot-high pile of debris and part of the building exposed. They credited a nearby bodega owner with helping people escape before the full collapse.
"All people have been evacuated from the partially collapsed building," the FDNY said.
Two people suffered minor injuries while evacuating the building, officials said, but no one was seriously injured or trapped.
More than 100 tenants were displaced. The Red Cross set up a shelter for them at Middle School 390.
Work was being done on the facade of the building, built in 1927, though the cause of the collapse is still under investigation, officials said. Police and firefighters remained at the scene Tuesday.
“Our main objective is to get to the bottom of that pile,” FDNY Chief of Department John Hodgens said at a news conference. “We'll be here until it’s down to the street level, just to make sure if there are any victims under there, hopefully we can get to them in time."
“We’re tunneling into that debris pile as safely as we can," Hodgens said. “Firefighters right now are in a dangerous position. We don’t know what caused this corner of this building to come down. We don’t know if any of it is going to come down."
A 2020 inspection found cracked brick and loose, damaged mortar on the building’s facade, Buildings Department records show. Commissioner Jimmy Oddo said Monday that work had started but he didn't believe any workers were there at the time of the collapse.
Oddo said officials would scrutinize drawings pertaining to the collapsed area. The images were submitted as part of permitting for the facade work.
“I want to be clear: Unsafe facade conditions is not the same as an unsafe building," he said at the news conference. While the property had seven unresolved violations, they weren't structural, he said.
Buildings Department records show the structure has nearly 50 apartments. Residents were being directed to the nearby middle school to get help, and the city was parking buses near the building as a place to stay warm.
The phone rang unanswered at a possible number for the building’s owner, the Associated Press reported.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.