A race to be the tallest, thousands of workers, a bomber crash and lifts that never stop. What I found out behind the scenes at the Empire State Building.
In 1930 New York had a race going on: who could build the tallest building in the world? The Empire State Building won, and it went up in only about 410 days.
## The builders
On the busiest days about 3,400 people worked on it. Many of the ironworkers were Mohawk men from Kahnawake, famous for working high up. Steel arrived already cut and numbered, so the building went together like a giant kit.
## The empty years
It opened in 1931, during the Great Depression. So many offices sat empty that people called it the "Empty State Building".
## Behind the scenes
Lifts, water pumps and heating keep running day and night, looked after by staff most visitors never see. New windows and lights cut the building's energy use a lot.
## Big moments
In 1945 a bomber flew into the building in fog. A lift operator survived a fall of 75 floors when her lift's cables broke. Lightning hits the top many times a year, and the building is built to take it.
About 4 million people a year visited before COVID, and well over 100 million have been to the top since it opened.