Structural failure (buckling) of columns in NY City building, 235 E 42nd Street

[Astronuc]

Someone failed to do proper calculations/analysis.

https://apnews.com/video/what-to-kn...-evacuations-0dace9e1f11e4387abeb03738d773200

"Images and videos of the Manhattan building analyzed by The NY Times show that the structural columns buckled directly beneath where the recent addition was built."
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2026/07/07/us/midtown-structural.html (subscription required).

Someone should not have signed off on the structure and modifications.

The unstable building is located at 235 East 42nd Street, NY City, 1.5 blocks from Grand Central Station; the building in question is the former Pfizer headquarters. It sits between 42nd and 43rd Streets on 2nd Avenue on the east side of Manhattan. The Socony-Mobil Building at 150 E 42nd St next block west from 235 East 42nd St houses the Australian consulate offices; it sits across trom the Chrysler Building. Various consulates are located in buildings surrounding the unstable building.

The New York City fire department said it received a call just before 8 a.m. ET about bricks falling from the 37-story building located on 42nd Street, which is being converted from an office building to residential apartments.

https://www.reuters.com/world/columns-manhattan-high-rise-buckle-prompting-evacuations-2026-07-07/

I expect the buckled columns were not designed for the additional load, and they should have been reinforced. It would appear someone cut corners. The building has been cited before for safety violations.


https://www.nbcnewyork.com/manhatta...rt-of-buckling-building-in-manhattan/6522605/

The former headquarters to Pfizer, located at 235 East 42nd Street, was in the process of being converted into residents apartments when the FDNY received a call about falling bricks around 8 a.m. Tuesday.

An assessment of the unstable structure prompted an immediate evacuation of the neighborhood for the foreseeable future.

Fire Chief John Esposito said the way the steel-framed building is constructed, “it would not be a total collapse, it would be more of a localized collapse.”

Tuesday evening, hours after city officials were alerted to buckling columns and sagging floors within a 37-story Manhattan high-rise building under construction.

Gensler, the architectural firm leading the project, says on its website that it is transforming a pair of 1970s-era office buildings by adding more than a dozen stories and redesigning an adjoining tower.

Buildings department records show the project has been fined by the city for several safety violations, including glass and metal falling off the building, along with an incident where a worker fell off a ladder.
. . . .
Fire officials said two columns appear to have buckled and there were multiple cracks and sagging floors between the 21st and 26th floors. From the street below, a badly bent column could be seen through a large glass window. The fire department also posted images of the column.

 

[.Scott]

There are two buckled columns that can be seen through windows from the outside. They are about 30 feet from each other.
There is nothing subtle about those two columns. It is not that they have just "scrunched". They have, as a practical matter, failed completely. Other structures in the building are now supporting their loads.

 

[Baluncore]

There are two buckled columns that can be seen through windows from the outside. They are about 30 feet from each other.

Shown in the video, is what appears to be two square-section concrete pillars, that have been crushed, failed in compression, and so are now held together only by their rebar. That is either a design problem or a US version of tofu dregs concrete, a failure of quality control.

The many slender internal steel wall frames were never designed to carry structural load, so they have all buckled as an immediate response.

So, I wonder what now supports the transferred load that the two failed concrete columns previously carried, and why has the failure not propagated. To me, that is suggesting tofu dregs quality in only those two columns as the explanation. Many other similar columns must be operating within their design safety margin.

 

[Astronuc]

Interesting commentary with some speculation about the cause.
https://www.cnn.com/2026/07/09/us/nyc-building-stabilized-what-next

They are expected to finish shoring up the affected floors by Thursday morning, said Nathan Berman, founder and managing principal of MetroLoft, which is the skyscraper’s developer.

Large-scale shoring operations happen regularly in New York City, as they are common in dense cities with older buildings, said Chris Cerino, past president of the National Council of Structural Engineers Associations and the Structural Engineers Association of New York.

Faulty columns supporting too much weight were to blame for the building’s structural damage, said Berman.

MetroLoft added roughly 18,000 square feet to 15 upper floors, and the additional load caused two columns to bend, Berman said. Those floors then shifted and sagged, some as much as four inches, he added.

The columns bent from either not being properly reinforced or “having been missed in the reinforcement process,” Berman said. The exact reason will be determined “in due time,” he said.

The buckled columns sit between the existing structure of the building and the new floors being constructed, which caused the floor to sag, city officials said.

It’s very unusual for beams to buckle in a building that is being remodeled and the issue presents a “unique” and “very challenging” situation, Cerino told CNN.

That's a troubling admission by Berman.

MetroLoft said it’s going to fix the issue that caused the structural damage and rebuild the affected portion alongside the ongoing construction.

Work to rebuild the buckled sections of the skyscraper won’t delay the construction project scheduled to be completed next year, MetroLoft said, adding it’s a localized situation that affects fewer than 30 apartments out of more than 1,600.

The project will add 19 floors to the existing 10-story building at 219 East 42nd Street and renovate the neighboring 33-story tower at 235 East 42nd Street, according to architectural firm Gensler.

The lawsuit was also brought against site owner 235 Fee Owner LLC, limited liability companies and others. The owner was also the subject of an anonymous complaint that the Department of Buildings investigated, accusing the company of performing construction contrary to previously approved plans.

Attorneys for the building’s defendants have denied the allegations in court filings and any liability for the accident, and have filed a third-party complaint against the construction company that employed Rojas [an injured worker].

Not a good sign.

A full investigation into the structural failure will help determine how it happened, what caused it and how similar incidents can be prevented in the future, the city’s Department of Buildings said.

 

[Baluncore]

The columns bent from either not being properly reinforced or “having been missed in the reinforcement process,” Berman said. The exact reason will be determined “in due time,” he said.

The pictures show that the columns do contain rebar. The bending of the columns occurred following the crushing and spalling of the concrete near the middle of the column. Failure of the top and bottom constraints would have followed immediately. That is the expected mode of failure for an insufficient concrete column. Apart from an external steel tube, more rebar reinforcement would not have prevented the concrete from being crushed.

 

[Hornbein]

"Work to rebuild the buckled sections of the skyscraper won’t delay the construction project scheduled to be completed next year,"

I don't believe them.

 

[Baluncore]

I don't believe them.

Neither do I.
It won't take long to jack up the floor and secure the damaged materials, but the investigation will hold construction up for months since there is the fear that more columns will fail. They cannot continue construction until the investigation releases its findings.

There is too much misdirection for a compressive failure. The publicity points to the tensile rebar, not at the quality of the compressive concrete. I don't believe the mafia still controls the concrete industry in New York, so what are they afraid of ?

There is no advantage in releasing a press statement, unless it is to cover one's individual liability. It seems, now is the time to obfuscate the evidence, pick a lawyer, point a finger, then select a sacrificial fall guy, the one with the best insurance cover.