The victim was checking his safe deposit box when someone closed the door for the night, not realizing he was still inside.
A 23-year-old man called 911 about being trapped inside a bank vault.
The incident occurred at the World Diamond Tower building in New York City. The vault is used by jewelers to safeguard millions of dollars worth of precious stones. The victim was checking his safe deposit box when someone closed the door for the night, not realizing he was still inside.
“The process was started to breach the wall at the vault. It’s about 30 inches or so of concrete,” New York City Fire Department Deputy Assistant Chief John Sarrocco says. “We started doing that, we got to the point where we got to the metal plating. The problem with the plating is we’d have to use our torches on there, which would infect the environment and that person inside the vault.”
Once the vault was shut, it could not open until the automatic clock expired. Firefighters had to wait nine hours for the door to open again, which it did precisely at 6 a.m..
“We had video on the person and also there’s a phone in there. So we also had the audio. And we were constantly assessing his health during that time,” Sarrocco says.
After being released from the vault, the man did not stop to talk to reporters. He was seen running away.
The security company told Inside Edition it had no comment.
