One person is dead and more than dozen others were rushed to hospital after a carbon monoxide leak inside a New York mall.
Three restaurants on Long Island's Walt Whitman Mall were evacuated after authorities detected dangerously high levels of carbon monoxide. (Via MSNBC)
Carbon monoxide is an odorless, colorless gas that can lead to death by suffocation. Investigators are apparently looking to the heating system of the mall's Legal Sea Foods restaurant as the cause of leak. (Via AlJazeera)
Local rescue workers arrived on the scene around 6 p.m. Saturday night after a woman, apparently overcome by the gas, fell and hit her head in the basement of the restaurant.
As they entered the building, they themselves reported feeling light-headed and nauseated, symptoms of carbon monoxide exposure, and told surrounding businesses in the mall to evacuate — suspecting a leak.
They also found 55-year-old restaurant manager Steve Nelson unconscious in the basement, where attempts to resuscitate him were unsuccessful. Nelson and the woman were rushed to the hospital, where he was pronounced dead. There is no immediate update on the woman's condition. (Via CNN)
Local police said 27 others, mostly restaurant employees and first responders, were also taken to local hospitals with non-life-threatening injuries. WABC reports all but a handful of patients have been treated and released as of Sunday morning. (Via WABC)
