Man Falls Into Sidewalk Grate In Front Of Midtown McDonald's

NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) - A man was taken to the hospital after falling down a sidewalk grate in Midtown Thursday.

As CBS2's Tracee Carrasco reported, it's probably something many pedestrians have thought of or and feared -- a man walking down the sidewalk one minute and the next, he tumbles several feet down through open cellar doors.

The man fell just before 3 p.m. in front of McDonald's at Fifth Avenue and 34th Street.

Chopper 2 footage shows the man being taken away on a stretcher after witnesses said he fell at least 12 feet down the open cellar door beneath the McDonald's and apparently hit his head.

He was taken to Bellevue Hospital in stable condition and is expected to be OK.

Witnesses also told Carrasco the cellar door had no cones or barriers up indicating that the door was open.

A manager inside the McDonald's, however, said there were cones up at the time and three employees were outside blocking the door.

One man parked on the street saw the crowd gathered around the open door and jumped in to help get the man out.

"My first instinct was just to go down there. So when I went out there, I saw a man on the floor in distress, he was bleeding all over the place," said good Samaritan Adrienne Rios. "He had a big laceration on the left side of his forehead, it was pretty ugly. And the guy was in his 70s."

The McDonald's manager told Carrasco the man may have been on his phone when the incident happened.