Empire State Building Plunge Kills Man

A 21-year-old man plunged to his death in an apparent suicide jump off the Empire State Building during the evening rush hour on Tuesday, authorities said.

The man, identified by as Yale University junior Cameron Dabaghi, was dead when rescue workers arrived at the 102-story skyscraper shortly before 6:30 p.m., police said. He jumped from the 86th floor observation deck.

"We are all deeply distressed by this news," Yale College Dean Mary Miller wrote in a message to students Wednesday morning.

According to the Yale Daily News, Dabaghi was an East Asian studies major scheduled to graduate in 2011.

The Empire State Building's observation deck is enclosed by a 10-foot high fence. It's not clear how Dabaghi got past the fence, the New York Daily News reports.

Tourists and office workers picked their way around police tape shortly after the Dabaghi's death, and police temporarily closed a block of West 34th Street, one of the busiest thoroughfares in midtown Manhattan.

The Empire State Building is the third-tallest building in the United States. More than 30 people have committed suicide at the building since it opened in 1931.

Before Tuesday, the most recent was believed to have been in 2006, when a man jumped from a vacant office on the 66th floor.

The skyscraper reaches 1,454 feet to the top of its lightning rod.

A spokeswoman for the building didn't immediately return calls. A management representative at the building said she knew nothing about the incident.