Mysterious Case of Water Gushing From Skyscraper Leaves People Confused

People of Philadelphia woke up to witness something strange this Sunday morning. They were shocked to see water gushing out of a 61-story-high skyscraper. The water was seen streaming out from the side of one of Philadelphia’s most iconic buildings- One Liberty Place.

The lack of fire alarm, along with no signs of damage, left the onlookers all baffled, The Philadelphia Inquirer reported. What seemed more strange was when fire officials, the Department of Licenses and Inspections and the city water department said that they had no explanation for the origin of this water either.

Contacted shortly after, a security person at Liberty Place also declined to comment on what might have been the cause of the incident.

A video of the mystery torrent of water first appeared on Twitter at about 7 a.m. after news website Billy Penn posted a clip. “There was a TON of water pouring out the top of One Liberty Place. Continues for like 5 mins. Anyone have info?” read the caption.

Netizens came up with some hilarious comments about the incident. “Sad thing is most passerbys didn’t look up and assumed it was raining,” wrote a user. Another commented, “Hope your mouth was closed.” “Damn, I just had my car washed,” lamented a user.

After almost 9 hours, at 4:30 pm, the mystery was finally resolved. Fire department spokesperson Kathy Matheson explained that the water was the result of a fire system test, caused by a lack of modern drainage in the building, built-in 1987.

“Newer buildings are equipped with special drainage systems that pull off most of the water that is generated by such tests,” Matheson told news website, Billy Penn. “Liberty 1 wasn’t required to have this because of when it was built.”

City officials, however, agreed that the building’s management should have taken better precautions.