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29 May 2026
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Vintage: The Empire State Building fire in New York, US
The Empire State Building fire started as a typical high rise operation, but included a May Day, low pressure in the standpipe hoseline, radios not working due to concrete and steel, a fire company stuck in an disabled elevator, window vented creating a wind-driven fire on the 51st floor and 200 people trapped on the 86th floor observation deck looking for advice.
Not a large fire, only two office rooms but large problems. It required a 5th alarm to control.
We did not know what we know today about wind-driven fire at 1830 hours on 16 July 1989, when a fire was reported in a suite of office rooms on the 51 floor of this world famous, landmark skyscraper, a Type I fire resistive 102-storey 400 x200, office building constructed in 1930.
First arriving fire companies could see the fire through tempered glass doors leading to the office suite had been partially broken and several empty fire extinguishers on the floor. Before they could act, heat from the fire shattered the double tempered glass doors forcing ladder firefighters to scramble back to a smoke proof fire tower assisting the hose team to hook up in the fire tower stair and hose line advance back down the hall to the fire.
It was going to be a routine job, as firefighters finally got water pressure from the standpipe system and moved down the hall to the burning suite of rooms, until a firefighter on the floor above reached down with a pike pole and broke several windows before the hose team was ready.
That hot summer evening a mild wind from the west-southwest, at 7 miles per blew against the south side of the 400 foot wide limestone structure and all hell broke loose.
This was no longer a routine fire; wind drove flame and heat out of the burning suite of rooms down the 20-foot hall into the path of an advancing hose team, it drove them back into the fire tower for safety.
Firefighters were now pinned down in the smoke proof tower stair as wind whipped flame, smoke and heat from the broken windows on 33rd street, through a 20-foot hallway into the fire tower vestibule, up a smoke shaft of the fire tower.
The May Day was cancelled after the firefighters passing the door, lost in a dead end hall portion, found the way back to the fire tower enclosure. For the next 30 minutes the hose team could not advance.
A second back-up hose line was stretched and even then two hose teams could not make it out of the fire tower -- too much heat too much fire blowing at them.
For 30 minutes the firefighters directed the hose stream from the fire tower, not able to advance. The firefighting strategy became an inside defensive fire attack strategy or a high rise “controlled burn” as it is sarcastically called; waiting for the desks, computers, chairs, paper and fancy wallpaper furnishing in the suite of rooms to be consumed by fire as firefighters protected the stairs in case the people from the observation deck descended.
There was no headway against the wind driven fire by two, 21/2 inch hoselines with smooth bore nozzles together discharging equivalent of two tons of water per minute for 30 minutes.
As the deputy chief there was plenty to do at the lobby command post. During this “no progress” time, I was occupied by the high rise firefighting problems: 200 people reported stranded on the 86th floor observation deck; numerous calls from other people in their offices asking for directions; a May Day signal transmitted and later rescinded; a ladder company reported they were stuck in an elevator; concrete and steel interfering with radio communications so we could not transmit from the lobby command post to operations on the 51st floor.
First we set up a radio relay from command to staging 3 floors below the fire; then from the 48th floor to operations post on the 50th floor, one level below the fire; I followed FDNY high rise firefighting standard procedures and told the fire safety director of the building to announce on the public address system, “The fire floor and floor above evacuate and everyone else remain in place." No one came down as long as the fire was being fought.
I notified the fire company they were below the fire and to stay in the elevator as everyone was fighting fire, and to notify command if conditions changed.
A second supply line to siamese, an increase in engine pressure and removal of the pressure regulating valve on the standpipe outlet solved the water pressure problem.
I knew this massive Indiana limestone and steel pre-war high rise building was the best structure in the city. This was the only good feeling I had about this fire until receiving a radio report from a pair of firefighters searching for victims on the fire floor requesting a hose line be stretched from the other “S” stairway. We had hoselines operating in the only other “F” stair on the 51st floor. The two firefighters reported discovering a smoke-free hallway leading from the “S” stair to the fire, allowing a close approach from a flanking direction and they guaranteed a quick knock down of the wind-driven fire if they got a hoseline to operate.
This was good news and bad news. The “S” stair had been designated an evacuation stair. The “F” stair, the fire tower, was the attack stair. The “S” evacuation stair was reserved if it became necessary to remove those 200-plus people from the 86th floor observation deck and above.
I had to make a decision knowing if we stretched a hose line from the “S” stair then both stairs serving the 51st floor would be attack stairs and could both fill up with smoke.
And also if this flanking attack with a third hose line was not successful, I would have to switch to a non-attack firefighting strategy, closing both stair doors and evacuating all the people down past the fire as it continued to burn without any hose line discharging.
After checking and receiving a report of “still no progress” from the “F” stair using two hose lines, I ordered another operations chief to supervise this third hose line flanking attack from the "S" stair and hoped for the best. We were in luck!
Photos: Peter Bossio, Paul Grimwood
Source: Vincent Dunn's Fire Battlespace
Not a large fire, only two office rooms but large problems. It required a 5th alarm to control.
We did not know what we know today about wind-driven fire at 1830 hours on 16 July 1989, when a fire was reported in a suite of office rooms on the 51 floor of this world famous, landmark skyscraper, a Type I fire resistive 102-storey 400 x200, office building constructed in 1930.
First arriving fire companies could see the fire through tempered glass doors leading to the office suite had been partially broken and several empty fire extinguishers on the floor. Before they could act, heat from the fire shattered the double tempered glass doors forcing ladder firefighters to scramble back to a smoke proof fire tower assisting the hose team to hook up in the fire tower stair and hose line advance back down the hall to the fire.
It was going to be a routine job, as firefighters finally got water pressure from the standpipe system and moved down the hall to the burning suite of rooms, until a firefighter on the floor above reached down with a pike pole and broke several windows before the hose team was ready.
That hot summer evening a mild wind from the west-southwest, at 7 miles per blew against the south side of the 400 foot wide limestone structure and all hell broke loose.
This was no longer a routine fire; wind drove flame and heat out of the burning suite of rooms down the 20-foot hall into the path of an advancing hose team, it drove them back into the fire tower for safety.
Firefighters were now pinned down in the smoke proof tower stair as wind whipped flame, smoke and heat from the broken windows on 33rd street, through a 20-foot hallway into the fire tower vestibule, up a smoke shaft of the fire tower.
The May Day was cancelled after the firefighters passing the door, lost in a dead end hall portion, found the way back to the fire tower enclosure. For the next 30 minutes the hose team could not advance.
A second back-up hose line was stretched and even then two hose teams could not make it out of the fire tower -- too much heat too much fire blowing at them.
For 30 minutes the firefighters directed the hose stream from the fire tower, not able to advance. The firefighting strategy became an inside defensive fire attack strategy or a high rise “controlled burn” as it is sarcastically called; waiting for the desks, computers, chairs, paper and fancy wallpaper furnishing in the suite of rooms to be consumed by fire as firefighters protected the stairs in case the people from the observation deck descended.
There was no headway against the wind driven fire by two, 21/2 inch hoselines with smooth bore nozzles together discharging equivalent of two tons of water per minute for 30 minutes.
As the deputy chief there was plenty to do at the lobby command post. During this “no progress” time, I was occupied by the high rise firefighting problems: 200 people reported stranded on the 86th floor observation deck; numerous calls from other people in their offices asking for directions; a May Day signal transmitted and later rescinded; a ladder company reported they were stuck in an elevator; concrete and steel interfering with radio communications so we could not transmit from the lobby command post to operations on the 51st floor.
First we set up a radio relay from command to staging 3 floors below the fire; then from the 48th floor to operations post on the 50th floor, one level below the fire; I followed FDNY high rise firefighting standard procedures and told the fire safety director of the building to announce on the public address system, “The fire floor and floor above evacuate and everyone else remain in place." No one came down as long as the fire was being fought.
I notified the fire company they were below the fire and to stay in the elevator as everyone was fighting fire, and to notify command if conditions changed.
A second supply line to siamese, an increase in engine pressure and removal of the pressure regulating valve on the standpipe outlet solved the water pressure problem.
I knew this massive Indiana limestone and steel pre-war high rise building was the best structure in the city. This was the only good feeling I had about this fire until receiving a radio report from a pair of firefighters searching for victims on the fire floor requesting a hose line be stretched from the other “S” stairway. We had hoselines operating in the only other “F” stair on the 51st floor. The two firefighters reported discovering a smoke-free hallway leading from the “S” stair to the fire, allowing a close approach from a flanking direction and they guaranteed a quick knock down of the wind-driven fire if they got a hoseline to operate.
This was good news and bad news. The “S” stair had been designated an evacuation stair. The “F” stair, the fire tower, was the attack stair. The “S” evacuation stair was reserved if it became necessary to remove those 200-plus people from the 86th floor observation deck and above.
I had to make a decision knowing if we stretched a hose line from the “S” stair then both stairs serving the 51st floor would be attack stairs and could both fill up with smoke.
And also if this flanking attack with a third hose line was not successful, I would have to switch to a non-attack firefighting strategy, closing both stair doors and evacuating all the people down past the fire as it continued to burn without any hose line discharging.
After checking and receiving a report of “still no progress” from the “F” stair using two hose lines, I ordered another operations chief to supervise this third hose line flanking attack from the "S" stair and hoped for the best. We were in luck!
Photos: Peter Bossio, Paul Grimwood
Source: Vincent Dunn's Fire Battlespace