US family seeks answers after woman falls into open Manhattan manhole

The family of a New York woman is seeking answers after she fell to her death when she stepped out of her car and slipped into an open maintenance hole on Manhattan’s Fifth Avenue.

The victim, identified by relatives as Donike Gocaj, 56, of Briarcliff Manor, a commuter belt community north of New York City, died Monday night.

Police said Gocaj parked her Mercedes-Benz SUV at West 52nd Street and Fifth Avenue in midtown Manhattan just before 11:20 p.m. She stepped out of the vehicle and directly into the open maintenance hole in front of the Cartier mansion.

Gocaj fell approximately 10 feet (3 meters), and steam caused her to go into cardiac arrest. She was rushed to a hospital, where she was pronounced dead.

Relatives told New York television station WABC that they are saddened and shocked by her sudden death.

Con Edison, the city’s electric utility provider, is investigating why the maintenance hole was left uncovered because no construction was taking place nearby.

The maintenance hole cover was found about 15 feet from the opening. Authorities are examining the possibility that a truck ran over it and caused it to dislodge.

“We are deeply saddened to confirm that a member of the public has died after falling into an open manhole,” Con Edison said in a statement. “We are actively investigating how this occurred. Our thoughts are with the individual’s family, and safety remains our top priority.”

New York’s Department of Environmental Protection, which oversees maintenance holes connected to sewers, has received more than 700 service requests for missing covers so far this year.

Injuries or deaths from open maintenance holes are relatively rare, but they remain an urban hazard akin to being struck by falling masonry, scaffolding, or an air conditioner, or being pushed onto subway tracks.

In 1979, a 17-year-old college student was killed by falling masonry on Broadway near West 115th Street in Manhattan, prompting mandatory facade inspections and revised scaffolding requirements.

Maintenance holes continue to pose risks. In 2019, an unhoused man was found dead in a Manhattan maintenance hole two weeks after he fell into it.

A 2022 study found that from 2007 to 2017, 388 trauma patients nationally fell into maintenance holes, or 20 to 49 per year.

One percent of those patients died as a result, according to the study.