Law Enforcement Sources Tell WNBC.com It Does Not Appear To Be A Terror Attack
POSTED: 9:13 am EST January 8, 2007
UPDATED: 10:30 am EST January 8, 2007
NEW YORK -- People over a large part of New York City are smelling a gas odor, and authorities are scrambling to determine the source.
The Port Authority said it believes the gas leak is coming from Bleecker Street.
Law enforcement sources tell WNBC.com that this does not appear to be an act of terror.
Four city schools were evacuated due to the smell, but have since been let back in.
"The smell was very strong. It was very scary," said Yolanda Van Gemd, an administrator at ASA, a business school at Broadway and 34th Street, which was evacuated as a precaution.
The Fire Department began getting calls about the odor around 9 a.m., said spokesman Tim Hinchey.
PATH service has been suspended into the 33rd Street station, although the service was still running to the World Trade Center Station. F and V subway service has been suspended at 23rd Street.
Service is still going into the World Trade Center station.
People between Midtown and Battery Park are reported to be smelling the odor, which was also reported in New Jersey.
In Jersey City, Maria Pignataro, the spokeswoman for Mayor Jerramiah T. Healy, said officials were told the odor in their city was due to a gas leak in the Chelsea section of Manhattan.
At NBC headquarters in Rockefeller Plaza, the odor is very strong. One person who works on the sixth floor at 30 Rockefeller Center said it was so strong that people are leaving the building.
At one major office building at 37th and 7th, employees have been told that Con Edison is looking into a smell, and they should remain inside until they hear otherwise.
Mayor Bloomberg is expected to be asked about it at a briefing with the media.
In August, a gaseous smell hit parts of Queens and Staten Island, sending seven people to the hospital.
Consolidated Edison officials had no immediate comment.
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