The Glass Inferno

CHAPTER 50

At the moment of the steam line explosion, four firemen were descending from the twentieth floor in one of the manual override elevators. There was no longer a dangerous fire zone on floors seventeen or eighteen; and the fire on sixteen had been knocked down for at least an hour. The men were tired and dirty and leaned against the walls of the cage without speaking. Ron Gilman, who had been lead hoseman earlier in the evening, had a badly scorched nose that was now a burned red and beginning to peel. Nick Pappas’ eyes were red and watering and every few seconds he had a fit of coughing. Sam Waters and Jake Lapides were in slightly better condition; they had served on the backup crews.

After a moment of silence once the doors had closed, Lapides said, “Christ, I hope all the tenants got out.”

“They didn’t-they never do,” Gilman said sourly. “The smoke Was too heavy, even with the ventilation system on reverse. When we start going through the apartments on the south side of the building, that’s when we’ll start finding them.”

“I don’t think I’d care to be part of the cleanup detail,” Waters said slowly.

“Weak stomach?” Pappas accused.

“You’re absolutely right,” Waters’ agreed sarcastically.

“I’ve been in this business for ten years and I’ve still got a weak stomach. The day I don’t, I’ll’ The steam explosion came at that moment. It must have been close, for the elevator cage shook violently and plunged downward. The lights went out abruptly. “Oh, my God!”.

Lapides yelled. A few feet farther down the wedge brakes jammed between the side rails and the cage.

and the elevator screeched to a halt. In the silence that followed, they could hear the thud of falling masonry as it hit the bottom of the elevator pit far below. Overhead, something that sounded like gravel rattled against the top and sides of the cage.

“For Christ’s sakes, somebody got a lantern?” There was a fumbling in the back of the cage and then a glow from a lantern held by Pappas.

“What the hell happened?” Lapides asked. His voice was shaking.

“Explosion,” Gilman said softly. “I think it snapped some of the hoist cables-did you hear that thudding sound? It sounded like the counterweight hitting the bottom. The rattling could’ve been caused by the steel ropes brushing the cage as they fell.”

Waters automatically punched the call board, with no response.

“We can’t stay here,” he said after a second.

“If the ropes are gone, we can’t depend on the brakes holding forever. Who wants to take a look around?”

“I’ll need a hand,” Gilman said. Pappas gave his lantern to Lapides and stepped under the escape hatch at the top of the cage. He thrust a knee forward and made a sling of his hands. Gilman placed his right boot in the cupped hands and held onto Pappas’ shoulders for support.

Pappas grunted and heaved upward while Gilman fumbled with the overhead panel, finally pushing it aside.

He clung to the edge of the access port. “Give me a boost, Nick.”

Pappas pushed upward and Gilman muscled his way through the opening.

There was a long silence from above and finally Waters shouted, “What the hell’s wrong up there?”

“It’s a mess,” Gilman yelled back. His face appeared in the opening.

“Four of the hoist ropes have been snapped and the counterweight’s blown off the other two.

There must have been two explosions-five or six floors around us are blazing and about a hundred feet up it looks like half the outside wall is gone.”

“What the hell are we going to do?” Lapides asked.

He was the youngest man of the four and close to panic.

Gilman hesitated, then called down: “Everybody up here.”

“You’re crazy,” Pappas said.

“You heard the man,” Waters grunted. “You want to stay here and roast?” The temperature in the cage was already noticeably warmer.

Lapides stepped in Pappas’ locked hands and jumped upward at the same time Pappas heaved him toward the port. Gilman caught his hands and a moment later he scrambled out on the roof of the cage. Waters followed almost immediately. Then they both leaned through the port and caught Pappas’ hands and sWung him up when he jumped. They pulled him through and he looked around and muttered, “Jesus Christ!”

Two of the hoist ropes lay coiled like black snakes on top of the cage; several more hung limp over the side. Two floors above them, flames roared from a breech in the utility wall while bits of crumbled mortar and construction block dribbled down from the shattered wall.

Flames were spraying directly from the floor in front of the cage and shooting up over the edge of the elevator’s roof, while opposite them and perhaps a hundred feet above, a mammoth break in the outside shear wall exposed the core to the cold air and snow. Bits of flaming debris were falling past their stalled cage, with an occasional piece landing on the ‘ roof itself.

“We’ve got to get out of here,” Gilman said quietly.

Waters smiled sardonically in the fire-lit gloom. “No shit-you got any ideas?”

“Yeah, we’ll have to make it down the hard way.”

“What are you guys talking about?” Pappas demanded.

“A couple of guys from the East Coast did it once,” Gilman explained.

“We go down one of the cables.”

Lapides began to stutter. “Hand over hand? Those ropes are covered with grease!”

“We’ll take a couple of hitches around them with our belts,” Gilman said. “And we can wrap our legs around the rope. But we’ll have to get rid of our coats and helmets and any binding clothing.”

There was a moment of silence. Then Waters took off his heavy turnout coat and dropped it over the edge of the elevator cage. It billowed open as it fell and then disappeared into the chasm below.

Lapides backed away from the, edge of the roof. “You’re nuts, Gilman; it’s a good eighteen floors to the bottom of the pit.”

“Pappas, hand me your pulldown hook,” Gilman said.

He took the tool and lay flat on top of the cage. He extended the hook, sagging one of the steel ropes that was free of its counterweight. There was sufficient slack in the rope so he was able to haul it close to the cage.

‘Okay, who’s first?”

“I don’t think I can make it,” Lapides said in a frightened voice.

“Then you’ll have to go first. If you go last and slip, you’ll take the rest of us with you.” Gilman shook his head sadly. “Sorry, kid, you. didn’t leave yourself an out-it’s got to be you.”

Lapides edged close to the rope and looked over the side of the cage.

The core below was smoky and lit with, flames from the burning floors.

Below that, it was pitch black; he couldn’t see the bottom.

Waters said, “Well, shit or get off the pot, Jake. We haven’t got all day.”

Lapides could feel the sweat drip off his upper lip.

“Don’t rush me.”

“Wait a minute,” Gilman said. “Tie the lantern to your waist so we can see.” He added, “Don’t slip-the rest of us are depending on you.”

“Take a double hitch with your belt around the rope,” Pappas said.

“I’ll help you down.”

“I can do it,” Lapides said, suddenly angry. The front of his pants felt wet. He wiped his gloves on his trousers and pulled hard at the belt he had looped around the rope, then lowered himself over the edge of the cage roof. He slipped a few feet, then clutched the rope with his legs, his turnout pants acting as a further brake. He started to lower himself down the rope.

“Don’t look down,” Gilman warned, then noticed that.

Lapides had closed his eyes.

“It’s slippery as hell,” Lapides said in a strained voice “but I think I can do it.”

As soon as Lapides had cleared the lower edge of the cab, Pappas followed, then Waters, and finally Gilman.

Above them, flaming debris rained down from the ruin floors.

“Remember, don’t look down!” Gilman yelled once more. He let go of the hook and grabbed the rope as it swung out from the cage. He slipped a foot before he could clutch the rope between his knees.

“It’s a piece of cake!” Lapides yelled. His lantern was bobbing twenty feet lower down the rope.

“Some cake,” Gilman grunted. Of the four men, he was the one who suffered the most from a fear of heights.