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Teen exploring abandoned bank gets stuck in vault

HOLLYWOOD, Fla. — A teen boy got trapped in an abandoned bank vault in Florida Wednesday.

Officer Christian Lata of the Hollywood Police told WTVJ, "Today at approximately 1 o'clock in the afternoon, officers of the Hollywood Police Department responded to a 911 call in reference to a possible trapped teenager inside an old bank vault here in Hollywood. Unfortunately, there were two juveniles that were playing around inside an abandoned bank and they didn't know that the vault was still active. Playing inside the vault, one of them got trapped inside and luckily, the other one was outside and was able to call 911."

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The 17-year-old was trespassing with another boy at an old Bank of America building when he became trapped inside the 14- by 14-foot vault. Members of the Broward County Sheriff's Office technical rescue team and the Hollywood Fire Rescue were attempting to cut through the vault's 2-foot thick walls, with little success.

"I got in contact with the vault door manufacturer in Akron, Ohio, they contacted the local reps in Miami and Ft. Lauderdale. They arrived on scene, they were a great assistance to us cause this is not something that we uh, a situation that we run into every day -- an abandoned bank with a vault door, a working vault door," said Battalion Chief Pat Keller of Hollywood Fire Rescue.

Authorities were able to contact the vault company, which sent two technicians who opened the vault using an old combination on file. "We had several combinations, previous combinations that they had on file because they used to service the door when this was a operating bank, so they had the previous combinations and they were able to finally crack the vault door... So we had the two Diebold Vault door specialists arrive on scene about 45 minutes ago, and they were trying multiple combinations and they were able to open the vault door. And we retrieved the young man, he's doing fine, rescue crew - uh, rescue 31 is checking his vital signs out now and they we're gonna release him back to his father," said Keller.

Police say right now it is uncertain if there will be charges pressed, but they're happy that the teen is safe and learned his lesson.