{"id":811735,"date":"2026-05-21T07:49:39","date_gmt":"2026-05-21T07:49:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/811735\/"},"modified":"2026-05-21T07:49:39","modified_gmt":"2026-05-21T07:49:39","slug":"gruesome-cause-of-death-revealed-for-donike-gocaj-grandma-who-plunged-to-death-down-nyc-manhole","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/811735\/","title":{"rendered":"Gruesome cause of death revealed for Donike Gocaj, grandma who plunged to death down NYC manhole"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Westchester grandmother who plunged into an open manhole in Midtown<\/a> died of scald burns and an assortment of other horrendous injuries, the city\u2019s medical examiner found Wednesday.<\/p>\n

The shocking death of Donike Gocaj<\/a>, 56, was ruled an accident <\/a>by the examiner, officials revealed.<\/p>\n

Gocaj fell into an uncovered manhole after parking her SUV along East 52nd Street near Fifth Avenue at around 11:20 p.m. on Monday.<\/p>\n

\"DonikaDonike Gocaj (right) who plunged into an open manhole in Midtown on Monday died of scald burns and an assortment of other horrendous injuries. Facebook\/Donika Gocaj<\/p>\n

\"ConGocaj\u2019s death was ruled an accident Tuesday by the examiner. Robert Mecea for New York Post<\/p>\n

She suffered burns that included inhalational thermal injuries<\/a>, along with blunt force trauma to her torso \u2014 all of which caused her death, the examiner found.<\/p>\n

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The ghastly combination of injuries is consistent with a fall into the superheated steam often found within New York City manholes, said Barbara Butcher, former chief of staff at the city\u2019s medical examiner\u2019s office.<\/p>\n

\u201cPerhaps the most damaging injury was the inhalation of steam, which would have damaged the alveoli, the tissue in the lungs, which transports oxygen to the bloodstream,\u201d Butcher said. \u201cWhen they swell, they can no longer bring in oxygen.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe steam would have caused her to have scald burns on her skin, but the real cause of injury would be the inhalation.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lee Ann Grossberg, a forensic pathologist in North Carolina, said such injuries are particularly dreadful.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat would have been a really painful death,\u201d she said,<\/p>\n

A witness said Gocaj \u2013 a devoted mom and grandmother who lived in Briarcliff Manor \u2013 hauntingly screamed \u201cI\u2019m dying\u201d as bystanders frantically tried to help her<\/a> before first responded arrived.<\/p>\n

The Con Edison utility hole she had \u201cdropped\u201d into appeared filled with boiling water and steam, the witness said.<\/p>\n

The medical examiner\u2019s ruling confirmed that Gocaj indeed died of horrific heat-related injuries.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Westchester grandmother who plunged into an open manhole in Midtown died of scald burns and an assortment…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":811736,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5122],"tags":[5229,12638,48396,5249,5248,405,403,5226,5225,5228,5227,67,586,132,5230,68,1154,2969],"class_list":["post-811735","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york","tag-america","tag-con-edison","tag-freak-accidents","tag-manhattan","tag-metro","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-newyork","tag-newyorkcity","tag-ny","tag-nyc","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-us-news","tag-usa"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116611473154223830","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/811735","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=811735"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/811735\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/811736"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=811735"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=811735"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=811735"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}