In the aftermath of the Roosevelt Island tram rescue, the New York Times picked five places you would not want to get stuck and presented them to the Fire and Police Departments to see how they would respond. Thoughts of getting stuck at the top were foremost on my mind when I rode the Wonder Wheel last year. Now that would be awful

Your cousin from Cleveland has persuaded you, against your better judgment, to ride the Wonder Wheel, and, at the 150-foot summit, it comes to a halt.

The power is out. How do you get down?

Step 1, Chief Norman said, is to call in one of the department’s 95-foot-tall tower ladders as a base of operations. Rescue workers would then climb the wheel’s steel skeleton, using ropes, clips and nylon webbing as safeguards.

With the stokes basket or a special seatlike device called a diaper harness, they would then lower riders either to the ladder’s platform or onto the ground.

The Fire Department has actually been itching for a chance to practice on the Wonder Wheel, Chief Norman said, and officials have gone so far as to stand at its base, planning rescues from below.

So far, however, the department has not been allowed to use the wheel for drills because of liability concerns. Chief Norman said its owners asked him, "You want to climb out there for what?" For practice, he told them.

The answer, he said, was no.