A car fell down a New York City garage elevator shaft Tuesday morning, injuring two people, the fire department said.

The victims were taken to the hospital and are in stable condition.

A parking attendant was driving into the elevator on the fifth floor of the garage around 9:45 a.m., but when he pulled in, the elevator car wasn't there, NBCNewYork.com reported. As the car plunged down, it injured a worker on a lower floor.

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 Firefighters had to extricate the driver from the vehicle. An FDNY spokesman told msnbc.com both he and the other garage employee were taken to Cornell Medical Center in stable condition.

The garage, which also serves as a Hertz rental location, is on East 76th Street near First Avenue in Manhattan.

A dentist who works near the garage told NBCNewYork.com he doesn't recall there being any major issues with the six-story garage, other than the elevator temporarily being out of order last winter during a power outage in the building.

The FDNY tweeted several pictures from the scene, including one of firefighters using pulleys to drag the car down from the shaft back down to street level.

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Authorities say South Carolina Hospitality Association president Tom Sponseller killed himself in the parking garage of his office building.

Columbia Police Chief Randy Scott said Sponseller's body was found around 10:45 a.m. Tuesday in a room in the garage, which had been searched three times in the 10 days since the 61-year-old lobbyist was reported missing.

Scott says a note found Tuesday in Sponseller's office referred to a federal investigation into the association's finances, but Scott would not give additional details.

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Scott says Sponseller was behind two locked doors in a room where people frequently took smoke breaks. Officers hadn't had the keys for the room before Tuesday. Sponseller was reported missing Feb. 18.

Richland County Coroner Gary Watts says it appears Sponseller shot himself in the head.

On Monday, federal officials confirmed to The Associated Press that they were investigating the disappearance of several hundred thousand dollars from the group, which lobbies for South Carolina's $14 billion tourism industry.

U.S. Secret Service Special Agent in Charge Michael Williams said agents began looking into the group's books several months ago but Sponseller had not been investigated specifically.

Instead, Williams said, agents were focusing on Rachel Duncan, who has served as an accounting director for the association. There was no answer Tuesday at a number listed for Duncan. Her attorney has declined to comment on the investigation but said Duncan had been cooperating with the investigation into Sponseller's disappearance.

Court records show Duncan is fighting foreclosure on a Lexington County property and in October was ordered by a judge to pay a bank nearly $4,000.

Rick Erwin, the association's interim director, has hired an accounting firm to do an audit of its finances to assure the association's 2,000 members that their financial contributions are secure in Sponseller's absence, according to Bob McAlister, a consultant for the group.

Sponseller, head of the association for more than 20 years, was a well-known fixture at the Statehouse representing the tourism industry. On Tuesday, House lawmakers held a moment of silence after learning of his death.

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