Upper East Site
MANHATTAN – Crews from multiple city agencies are converging on the Upper East Side, the scene of a massive sinkhole that opened up on a Yorkville street this morning– caving in part of East 89th Street around 8:25 this morning.
The gaping hole in the street is just east of York Avenue and believed to be roughly 15 feet by 15 feet— going down 20 feet deep. It was first reported by the city’s Office of Emergency Management in a tweet just after 8:30 am.
Sinkhole: Traffic delays in the area of East 89th Street and York Avenue in Manhattan. Consider alternate routes. Multilingual & ASL Link: https://t.co/KVVnlbeL5T
— NYCEM – Notify NYC (@NotifyNYC) July 15, 2021
Thankfully, no injuries were reported, according to the FDNY.
Upper East Site was there as workers used jackhammers to work on the rim of the sinkhole, removing unstable pieces of asphalt— then, workers stopped to put a ladder in the giant hole.
One man climbed down, using a shovel to clear dirt and a wrench to work on the underground cables now exposed to the light of day.
A neighbor walking past the scene yelled to ConEd and Department of Environmental Protection workers, “they fixed it four times!!”
The neighbor was referring to an underground water main leak that he believes is the cause of today’s roadway collapse on East 89th street.
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For its part, the DEP tells Upper East Site its workers are on scene investigating water and sewer infrastructure and trying to determine the cause of today’s roadway cave-in, but pointed to the Mayor’s Management Report which noted a 29% drop in complaints of cave-ins year to year.
That’s little comfort to some neighbors, especially after a massive sink on the Upper West Side swallowed parts of two cars on Riverside Drive last week.
Upper East Side Councilman Ben Kallos shared more details on the situation– pointing to a water and sewer main being investigated as the possible cause. Kallos says the water has been turned off to two buildings on the block, however, only one building is occupied.
The Councilman adds that ConEd is monitoring a high pressure gas main.
We reached out to the Departments of Emergency Management and Transportation for more information regarding the collapse, both agencies directed us back to DEP.
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