Trump Tower’s 50th floor was the location of a 4 alarm fire this evening, the second fire in the high rise this year. One resident, a 67 year old man, was killed and 4 firefighters were injured but are expected to recover. No members of the Trump family were in Trump Tower at the time of the fire.
The President tweeted at 6:42 pm, “Fire at Trump Tower is out. Very confined (well built building). Firemen (and women) did a great job. THANK YOU!” Authorities state that the fire was brought under control at 7:40 pm.
Fire at Trump Tower is out. Very confined (well built building). Firemen (and women) did a great job. THANK YOU!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 7, 2018
There were no sprinklers on the floor where the fatality occurred. From MSN:
New York City did not mandate sprinklers in every unit and common hallways of new residential buildings until March 1999 when then-Mayor Rudy Giulini signed council legislation. That was well after the opening of Trump Tower in February 1983.
The upper floors of Trump Tower, which are have 263 apartments, do not have sprinklers, Nigro told Spectrum News NY1, the 24-hour cable-TV news channel that serves New York’s five boroughs.
Regardless of the fact that sprinklers were not mandated, this aspect of the story will become an issue, no doubt. I find it odd that a man of his wealth would not voluntarily install sprinklers to keep his family and tenants safe.
From Reuters:
Fire officials have not yet released a suspected cause of the blaze, adding no member of the Trump family was in the building at the time.
“This was a very difficult fire. As you can imagine, the apartment is quite large, we are 50 stories up. The rest of the building had a considerable amount of smoke,” Fire Commissioner Daniel Nigro said on Twitter.
About 200 fire personnel responded to the incident that the department said was a four-alarm fire.
