Heartless visitors mug for selfies at East Village blast siteSelf-absorbed jerks are treating the East Village gas-explosion site like a tourist attraction, shooting grinning selfies of themselves even as rescuers search for life in the ruins where two bodies might still be buried.Amid the backdrop of the devastation wrought by the explosion, fire and collapse of three buildings that injured 25 people, seven smiling women used a selfie stick late Friday to snap a cheery photo of themselves.
“Disgusting beyond words,” wrote a commenter on the local-news blog EV Grieve, which reposted the snap.
“Take a look at these people. Remember their faces,” wrote Diane DiDonato, of Brooklyn, on Facebook. “They don’t deserve those smiles. People are dying behind them.”
Others called it “disaster porn.”
“It’s heartless,”said Maurice Herz, 83, of the East Village.
“THIS IS A TRAGEDY NOT A TOURIST ATTRACTION,” one frustrated neighbor wrote in a sign taped to a front door on nearby 7th Street. “SHOW SOME RESPECT,” the sign demanded.
Other selfie-snappers included Christina Freundlich, whose LinkedIn profile lists her as a communications director for the Iowa Democratic Party. She posted a grinning photo of herself at the scene giving the peace sign.
“Too soon,” one follower chided.
Residents near the blast site posted messages to the selfie-snappers.Photo: Demetrius E. Loadholt
Freundlich couldn’t be reached for comment Saturday.
East Villager Pablo Fernandez wore a green “Elf” shirt and red and white leggings as he posed for photos near a barricade before his bachelor party.
“I’m totally ridiculous, but I’m not normally like this,” Fernandez said.
His pals shot a video of him dancing near the site.
“This is so we could send the pictures to our friends in Spain and say, ‘Look what we did,’ ” said a chum who declined to give his name.
Jeanie Slade’s disaster-site selfie showed her and a pal flashing open-mouthed grins and the hashtags “#beingtourists and “#weresocreepy.”
Asked about the selfie by The Post, Jeanie called it “satire.”
“My heart goes out to the people of New York, and this satire post was in poor taste,” she insisted. “My intention was to point out how many people post selfies in inappropriate times and it backfired.”