The Sukkah fiasco at the Rye Town Hilton by Rabbi Yair Hoffman

Five Towns Jewish Times     If the facts reported are correct, the events that unfolded this past Sukkos at the Rye Town Hilton are a bit shocking.  Apparently, a few hours before Sukkos began, the Westchester Department of Buildings came down and forbade use of the Sukkah designated for use by over 200 guests.  They then actually confiscated the Schach to ensure that the Sukkah not be used.  Although the tour operators offered to post 24 guards and fire personnel to ensure the safety of the guests, the offer was not accepted.

It seems that some people did get hold of two pop-up sukkos and the three days of Yom Tov were spent with the guests switching off making kiddush in these two smaller sukkos.

There is no doubt that hearing and reading of this incident will cause quite a stir, however, in this article we will deal solely with the halachic aspects of the incident.

The issues can be divided into two parts:  The first is how best to handle the situation from a halachic perspective.  The second issue is how best to try and ameliorate the lack of a Sukkah on Yom Tov.

HANDLING THE SITUATION

Regarding the first issue, it would seem that the hotel kitchen staff should prepare mini portions of meat and challah.  Each male guest should wash before entering  one of the two pop-up Sukkos, make Kiddush on wine,  Hamotzi on bread and eat the mini meat portion.  He should then bentch.  The entire process should take between five and seven minutes.  He may have a second meal in the regular hotel and avoid mezonos foods, bread, and wine. [...]