'My friend! She fell off the building!' Neighbors reveal horrified cries of man whose date plunged 17 floors to her death on their first date

Jennifer Rosoff, 35, was on a first date when she fell to her death

She placed leg on balcony but it gave way and sent her plummeting 140 feet

Neighbours heard horrifying screams of her date Stephen Close, 35

Police source said Mr Close tried to warn the woman to get down

Promising career: Advertising executive Jennifer Rosoff was on a first date when she plunged to her death

A horrified man was heard screaming 'My friend fell! She fell off the building!' after his date plummeted to her death from a 17th-storey balcony.

Stephen Close, 35, had been out to dinner with Jennifer Rosoff, 35, on Wednesday evening before she invited him back to her apartment in New York.

At just before 1am yesterday the pair, who were on their first date, went onto the narrow balcony of the apartment for a cigarette.

But when Miss Rosoff placed her leg on the railing to stretch, insisting to her concerned date that it was safe, the balcony collapsed, sending the successful advertising executive plummeting 140 feet to her death.

As reported by the New York Post, witnesses heard Mr Close, who works in real estate, scream : 'My friend fell! She fell off the building!'



A witness said he was 'hysterical' and ran outside screaming 'Oh my god!'



Speaking to the newspaper, a police source said Mr Close tried to warn the woman to get down.

He heard two pops before the railing buckled, sending his date plummeting to the ground.



'He looked at the balcony, and he told her, "Look, this thing looks unstable. Hey, maybe you want to get down," the source said.



Emergency crews pronounced Rosoff dead at the scene. The medical examiner will determine a cause of death.

Rosoff, who graduated from Tulane University in New Orleans with a degree in communications, worked at The New Yorker, Lucky Magazine and Cosmopolitan before recently joining a new media advertising startup called TripleLift employing about 15 people, according to her LinkedIn profile.



‘Her tremendous energy and humor brought so much joy to the office,’ the chief executive, Eric Berry, said in a statement. ‘The entire company is distraught by the loss of Ms. Rosoff — she will be deeply missed.’

Her Twitter account was updated shortly before her fatal fall.



As news of Rosoff's tragic death spread online, tributes started pouring in from devastated co-workers and friends.

Rosoff's sister, Alexis Treeby, heard about her sister's tragic demise at about 5am.

'She was a lovely person. My children adored her,' Treeby told DNAinfo . 'She was kind, generous and did charity work.'

Jennifer Rosoff, 35, plunged 17 floors to her death after the balcony railing gave way when she leaned on it

The two metal balcony railings on Rosoff's corner apartment were bent down in a V-shape

Those who knew her described Rosoff as an 'A-player' in the highly competitive media advertising field who was career-driven and very athletic.

‘Jenn was a force to be reckoned with, smart, dynamic and charismatic,’ Lisa Hughes, the publisher of The New Yorker, told the New York Times .

Danny Bellish, 26, a sales manager at the food magazine Saveur, recalled to amNY how in 2009, Rosoff drew a map for him on the back of a menu outlining all the things he needed to do to advance his career.

Rosoff, who at the time worked for Cosmopolitan, also helped Bellish's girlfriend land an internship and organized a trunk show for his mother's jewelry business.

The gray brick high-rise building on Manhattan's Upper East Side was built before World War II.

Only the higher-floor corner apartments have balconies, and the city's buildings department ordered residents to stay off them following the woman’s deadly fall.



A photo of the corner balcony of the apartment where Rosoff lived shows the top two metal railings bent down in a V-shape. Buildings officials took part of the broken railing to examine how it could have given way and plan to determine whether the other balconies are structurally sound.



The company that manages the upscale Manhattan building was slapped with a fine earlier this year for filing a safety inspection reports several months late, it was revealed tonight.



However the safety inspection was carried out and residents maintain the building was well maintained.



In 2010, after 24-year-old social worker Connor Donohue fell from his 24th-floor balcony at 330 East 39th Street when the railing gave way, the city conducted safety inspections on hundreds of residences. Tenants at 16 buildings were ordered to stay off their balconies because they were deemed unsafe.

'A-player': Rosoff's friends described her as a 'force to be reckoned with' who was career-driven and athletic

Some 800 building owners failed to file mandatory inspection reports on the safety of their balconies and terraces, officials found. They are required to file every five years.

For Rosoff's building, which was bought by the property management company Stonehenge a year-and-a-half ago, the inspection report was last filed in February several months past due, causing the company to incur a $250 penalty.



Local residents said their apartment building is well-maintained and that Stonehenge has been making major improvement to the units.



In a written statement, the management company said: ‘This is a tragedy and our sincere condolences go out to the family and friends of Ms Rosoff.



Dynamic: Rosoff, a graduate of Tulane University, worked at The New Yorker, Lucky Magazine and Cosmopolitan before recently joining a new media advertising startup

‘We are cooperating fully with the investigation into the cause of this terrible accident.’

Those who knew the 35-year-old described her as an 'A-player' in the highly competitive media advertising field who was career-driven and very athletic.

Jennifer Rosoff went outside for a cigarette with her date, who she met online, about 12.50am Thursday when the railing of the narrow balcony collapsed after she propped her leg on it to stretch, according to DNAinfo.

When the volunteer charity worker's date told her that it wasn't safe to lean on the railing, she insisted she 'did it all the time' before tumbling from the Stonehedge 57 apartment ledge, landing on construction scaffolding on the first floor.



Emergency crews pronounced Rosoff dead at the scene.

Associated Press said the railings were made of metal, which witnesses claim were 'bent and twisted'.



New York Post claims its sources revealed the date told police he heard two sharp pops before the railing collapsed.



Police have cleared the man, who had met Rosoff in person for the first time that night, of any possible wrongdoing.



DNAinfo reported the man's parents answered his apartment door and said he was home, but declined to comment.

Neighbors at the 400 East 57th Street building, near First Avenue in Manhattan's Midtown East, compared the sound of Rosoff's fall to a 'gunshot' and a 'punch'.

Soda executive Steve Hersch, who lives two doors down from Rosoff, told DNAinfo : 'I heard a bang. I thought it was a gunshot.'



Sara Shubert said: ' It sounded like a 200-pound punch.'

Precaution: The city's buildings department ordered residents to stay off their balconies following the woman¿s deadly fall