New York City, NY – A company promoting an escape apparatus for high-rise disasters has run into high-level resistance from Mayor Bloomberg.
The escape system would be a backup if elevators and stairwells are knocked out. Up to 150 persons could be evacuated on each trip, and firefighters and other emergency personnel could ride back up.
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The manufacturer, Escape Rescue Systems Ltd., wants to spend more than $1 million of its own funds to install a test model of the escape system at 2 Penn Plaza, a 32-story building near Penn Station. The building’s landlord, has agreed.
But city emergency officials have nixed the idea, and the mayor is backing them up.
“I think their conclusion is that it really isn’t practical in this city,” Bloomberg said after backers of the apparatus held a news conference outside City Hall to urge reconsideration.
Yoni Shimshoni, the CEO of Escape Rescue Systems, said “the high-rise capital of the world” would be a natural test spot for his device.