Metro

One dead after carbon monoxide leak at Long Island mall

The manager of a Long Island restaurant was killed and 27 others were sickened by carbon monoxide that leaked into the eatery’s basement in the Walt Whitman Shopping Center on Saturday.

The dead man was Steven Nelson, 55, who worked at Legal Sea Foods in the Huntington mall, cops said.

Another restaurant employee, a woman, was also in the basement at the time and was taken to Huntington Hospital in critical condition. Her condition was later upgraded to stable.

Both had arrived in cardiac arrest, cops said.

Also rushed to local hospitals were 26 other people, all restaurant employes or rescue workers, suffering less serious carbon monoxide poisoning.

They included three cops and four medics.

All 26 were in stable condition and expected to be released by Sunday morning, authorities said

Legal Sea Foods and two other restaurants, Cheesecake Factory and Panera Bread, were evacuated. All three eateries are in a separate building not attached to the main mall, which remained open.

Police are investigating the cause of the leak, which happened just before 6 p.m. and are focusing on the building’s heating system.

The mall, one of the busiest in Suffolk, includes Bloomingdale’s, Macy’s, Lord & Taylor and Saks Fifth Avenue.