A harrowing video shared online by the New York City Police Department shows officers going above and beyond to assist a woman who was dangling on the side of a skyscraper on May 1.
Officers with the NYPD’s Emergency Service Unit were dispatched to the call, according to a time stamp on a clip shared on the department’s X account.
“When the public needs help, they call the police. When the police need help, they call ESU,” the NYPD said of last week’s scare atop a massive building.
The department added, “ ESU detectives recently saved a distraught woman on a rooftop 54-stories up using their rope rescue skills.”
The video shows a number of officers comforting the woman as they worked to bring her to safety.
When the public needs help, they call the police. When the police need help, they call ESU. @NYPDSpecialops ESU detectives recently saved a distraught woman on a rooftop 54-stories up using their rope rescue skills.
Watch the body-worn-camera footage of the rescue⬇️ pic.twitter.com/mQrg5o3M8M
— NYPD NEWS (@NYPDnews) May 6, 2024
Not only did those who responded save the woman’s life, but the officers spoke to her with compassion — one of them while dangling from a safety rope.
“We’re right here, okay?” a female officer told the stressed women. “We’re not going anywhere.”
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A male officer with a safety harness also spoke to the woman in a gentle tone, asking her what her name was and explaining to her that he would bring her to safety.
The woman’s face was blurred out and her name was edited out of the clip.
But when she was brought to safety an officer explained, “I got her!”
The NYPD did not offer a lot of context to the video, other than to suggest in a separate X post that the woman might have planned to jump from the skyscraper.
“If you, or someone you know are experiencing a crisis, know that you are not alone,” the NYPD wrote. “Help is available, and you have options.”
If you, or someone you know are experiencing a crisis, know that you are not alone. Help is available, and you have options.
Click here for more info:https://t.co/s4xwa6lQ32
— NYPD NEWS (@NYPDnews) May 6, 2024
The department did not identify the building, but the U.K.’s Daily Mail reported it was located in Midtown Manhattan.
The NYPD is sadly no stranger to calls about people jumping from city skyscrapers.
A number of people have made headlines for taking their own lives by jumping from New York City buildings.
In July of last year, three separate men ended their lives in the same way in a 24-hour period, the New York Post reported.
Each of the men was over the age of 60.
