Tourists once again climbed the stairs of Manhattan’s beehive-shaped Vessel sculpture after it reopened for the first time in three years, now with nets intended to reduce the risk of suicides like the four that forced its closure.
About 75 visitors bought tickets and queued to enter the metal honeycomb design when it opened Monday morning.
Within minutes, they passed through a security checkpoint and navigated the stairs and viewing platforms, the tallest of which measures about 150 feet.
The flexible net allowed visitors to take out their phones, but not their bodies, to capture views of the sculpture’s interior and the surrounding cityscape.
The Vessel, the vertical honeycomb sculpture and tourist platform at Hudson Yards in New York City, reopened with added safety features and has been closed since 2021.
The boat was closed after a 14-year-old boy jumped to his death in July 2021.
“The photographs that can be taken from below and from above are very beautiful,” said Alexandre Paes, a software engineer from Rio de Janeiro.
The Vessel opened in March 2019 and quickly became one of the Big Apple’s hottest new tourist attractions, with hundreds of thousands of visitors.
But tragedy struck just 11 months after it opened, when Peter DeSalvo, a 19-year-old Connecticut college student, jumped to his death from the structure’s 16th floor in front of dozens of tourists.
DeSalvo, from Basking Ridge, New Jersey, was a freshman at Sacred Heart University, where he also played rugby.
Then, in December 2020, Yocheved Gourarie, 24, of Brooklyn, committed suicide on the Vessel.
The next day, his apparent suicide note was shared in a scheduled posthumous post on his Instagram account.
Gourarie then wrote: ‘Hey. This is quite surreal isn’t it? You could say uncomfortable. Discordant. Just close the app now if you want. I guess if you don’t already know you should probably sit down.
Peter DeSalvo, 19, jumped to his death from the 16th floor of the structure in front of dozens of tourists in February 2020.
‘If you’re reading this, I’m leaving. Either that or I’m somehow incapacitated in the hospital so I can’t delete this scheduled post. I really hope it’s not.’
In the post, he acknowledged that publishing his suicide note would likely cause his parents pain.
“I don’t want to do that, I just want to leave my last mark on this world,” Gourarie wrote.
‘You all have made my life so much fuller, brighter and happier than it would have been without you. Your support, your encouragement, your hugs, your invitations, your smiles, your texts, your tags in memes that you think I would find funny.’
He ended the post by writing, “I love you.”
In December 2020, 24-year-old Yocheved Gourarie (left and right) committed suicide on the Vessel. She posthumously shared a suicide note in a scheduled Instagram post.
This is not the first time the site has closed and reopened with new security measures.
After three people jumped to their deaths from the structure, it reopened with security guards and an unusual rule: No one could visit alone.
Despite those safety measures, another person died in 2021, forcing it to close again.
On that occasion, a 14-year-old boy from New Jersey jumped from the eighth floor of the 150-foot structure during a visit with his parents, sister and grandmother.
The Vessel reopened Monday with floor-to-ceiling mesh barriers in all walkable sections, partially obstructing some views and closing much of the upper levels to visitors.
The Ship has networks designed to reduce the risk of suicides such as those that forced its closure
The sculpture was designed by Thomas Heatherwick and manufactured in Venice. But security problems took its sponsors by surprise.
“We wanted people to come here and have fun,” said Andy Rosen, chief operating officer of Related Businesses, which owns Hudson Yards.
On Monday, tourists did just that, taking selfies and chasing the ever-changing light that bounces off adjacent skyscrapers and filters through hexagonal openings.
“It’s a bit of a page-turner,” Rosen said, adding that even the narrowest set of views allows visitors to interact with the sculpture and create a unique experience.
“The net is good, not only for safety but also for people like me who are afraid of heights,” said Daniel Palumbo of Pennsville Township, New Jersey.
The Vessel rises from the ground like a stretched basket, hollow in the center with climbable stairs on the lower levels in all directions.
The reopened portions of the structure allow visitors to climb the highest level in a single section at the exit of the structure’s elevator, facing the tallest chrome and glass skyscrapers at Hudson Yards.
The flexible mesh allows visitors to take out their phones, but not their bodies, to capture views of the sculpture’s interior and the surrounding cityscape.
‘This particular view I don’t think is the best one we can take pictures of. “I think it would be nice to go there and take one of the river,” Paes said, adding that he had already seen a more glorious view of the Hudson River from nearby Little Island Park.
The elevator was not working Monday morning, preventing some people from reaching the top and resulting in at least one customer getting a refunded ticket.
“I came two years ago and it was closed,” said Andrea Niño de Guzmán of Milwaukee, who posed for photos with one of her cousins, who was visiting from Guadalajara, Mexico.
He said a third cousin, who was visiting from Sweden and used a wheelchair due to a temporary injury, left after the elevator malfunction was discovered, and operators refunded the woman’s $10 ticket, he said. Guzmán’s child.
The Vessel will be open daily from 10 am to 9 pm and on Thursdays admission will be free for New York City residents.
If you or someone you know needs help, you can contact Samaritans NYC at 212-673-3000 or Trevor Lifeline at 1-866-488-7386.
For confidential assistance, call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 988.