The man, identified only as a 40-year-old from Florida, jumped from the sun deck of the 22nd-floor fitness center. The driver, Engel Nicasio, was having a cup of coffee as he waited for his passenger when he hard a “loud boom” that made him duck.
Michael Schwartz /for New York Daily News
Scene at West 55th Street and Fifth Avenue, where an unidentified man jumped from the Peninsula Hotel landing across the street from the entrance on top of a SUV with Engel Nicasio,(shown here) its driver inside, who miraculously was uninjured.(Michael Schwartz/ for New York Daily News)
A man jumped to his death from the roof of a midtown hotel Thursday morning, crushing a Cadillac Escalade that was parked across the street as the driver sat in the SUV drinking coffee, police said.
The apparent suicide occurred at 8:55 a.m. at the posh Peninsula Hotel on Fifth Ave., near 55th St.
The man, identified only as a 40-year-old from Florida, jumped from the sun deck of the 22nd-floor fitness center, landing on the Cadillac Escalade on 55th St. across from the hotel.
The driver of the luxury SUV said he was inside the SUV having a cup of coffee as he waited for his passenger when he hard a “loud boom” that made him duck.
“When I looked up, I saw my whole passenger side was crushed in from above,” said the driver, Engel Nicasio, 37. “I thought it was a construction accident or debris from a building.”
He exited the vehicle and saw the real horror: the body.
“I was in shock,” he said. “I had never seen a body like that, it was horrible. I just stood there staring at it until someone pulled me away.”
Michael Schwartz /for New York Daily News
Scene at West 55th Street and Fifth Avenue, where an unidentified man jumped from the Peninsula Hotel, crushing a Cadillac Escalade that lay in his wake.
Another witness described a horrific crash before he also saw the dead man.
“The body [was] all twisted on the sidewalk,” said Armando Aiellano, 50, an air-conditioning repair man who was on a coffee break.
“It’s terrible. He hit the car and then [fell] onto the sidewalk.”
It was not immediately clear if the suicide had been staying at the hotel, where rooms run from $1,000 to $4,000 per night.
