Parking garage partially collapses onto cars inside
By Jesse Zanger, Alice Gainer
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WHITE PLAINS, New York (WCBS) — A parking garage partially collapsed in White Plains Wednesday morning
It happened around 9:08 a.m. on Hale Avenue and South Broadway. City officials say several roads are closed around the area.
Officials said the fifth floor partially collapsed into the fourth floor.
Video shows multiple emergency vehicles near the large parking garage. A photo shows a metal beam apparently came down, along with slabs of concrete, crushing at least three cars within the garage. There are up to 15 cars in the collapse zone, officials said.
The garage, located at 50 Hale Avenue, is connected to Westchester One office tower, next to the Westchester Mall and Senesta Hotel.
“This morning, we received word of a partial collapse in this garage. The most important thing I can say at the beginning – no injuries, no fatalities,” Mayor Tom Roach said.
“We’re blessed that it wasn’t something more tragic. If it was at 8:30 in the morning, who knows what would’ve happened when people were coming into work. So we’re blessed that there really wasn’t anybody inside the garage,” White Plains Public Safety Commissioner David Chong said.
It’s not yet clear what caused Wednesday’s collapse.
Fire departments from Yonkers, New Rochelle, Scarsdale and more all responded to assist.
“We’ve had a great, supportive response from mutual aid, so we have all types of equipment here,” Roach said. “But the bottom line is that what we’re working on now is shoring up the garage to make it safe to remove the vehicles that are in there. The fire department, along with multiple fire departments that are assisting us, is actually constructing columns. They put in columns initially, but they’re constructing more substantial columns to ensure the safety of anyone who goes into the building.”
Once engineers sign off on that, vehicles will be removed from the garage under police supervision. Officials expressed optimism that process may start by the end of the day Wednesday, though it may take longer.
In 2023, a parking garage collapse in Lower Manhattan killed one person and injured several others. That collapse prompted New York City officials to implement a new inspection program, requiring owners of some 4,000 parking garages in the city to submit reports on their garage’s safety. As part of that report, an engineer is required to walk through each garage and make note of conditions.
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