Dozens of diners last night fled a minor fire at the famed Rainbow Room – many walking off their dinners by descending 65 flights of stairs from the top of 30 Rockefeller Plaza.
The good news: They didn’t have to pay their sky-high checks.
Daniel Bonnafe, a honeymooner from Montreal, said that at first, all the commotion made him think someone had suffered a heart attack.
“Then I saw smoke at the door,” he said.
Bonnafe and his wife, Louise Veilleux, headed for the stairs with everyone else.
“Everyone was running. People were panicking,” he said.
The couple said that, in their rush to get out, they and others didn’t pay for their meals.
But asked if they’d go back, Bonnafe said he’d had enough of high-rise restaurants, at least for a while.
“Tavern on the Green – it’s the best,” Bonnafe said of the famed, one-story restaurant at Central Park.
The 9:30 p.m. blaze – in a construction area closed off from the rest of the restaurant – was quickly contained by sprinklers.
“It was a routine fire in a spectacular building,” said Battalion Chief Ed Geraghty.