A dizzy spell may have caused the death of a New Jersey architect who fell off a midtown skyscraper, officials said Friday.
Bruno Travalja, 52, of Ridgewood, N.J., was wearing a safety harness but it wasn’t tied to anything when he plummeted from a deck on the 47th floor of the skyscraper at 153 W. 53rd St. near 7th Ave. Thursday afternoon, officials said.
He was taking measurements when he plummeted, landing on a second floor ledge at the rear of the building, police said.
“I’m sad — that’s it. I’m just sad,” his devastated wife Alexis Travalja, 40, told the Daily News Friday.
“He was the most honest, hard-working, truthful human being who ever walked the face of the planet. It was a tragic accident.”
Travalja, the co-owner of Crowne Architectural Systems, had gone to the roof to survey it, a city official said. A glass barrier for a rooftop terrace was going to be installed there, the official said.
Travalja walked toward the ledge, which was protected by an 18-inch-high parapet or barrier.
He knelt to check something, stood up and then plummeted over the parapet, the official said. Investigators are looking into whether he became light-headed or dizzy.
The city Buildings Department issued a full stop work order on the jobsite Thursday.
Alexis Travalja said she and her husband founded Crowne Architectural Systems, which builds windows and curtain walls, 11 years ago in their basement.
“He and I did it entirely on our own,” she said. “It was growing and doing well.”
Travalja grew up in Queens and attended Pratt Institute, a school that he loved, his wife said.
One of his proudest accomplishments was the work he later did on a building at Pratt.
He had three children — a daughter, 17, a son, 15, and a son, 13.
An investigation by the NYPD and Department of Buildings inspectors is continuing.
With Chelsia Rose Marcius, Thomas Tracy
