City Tries To Avoid More Crane Disasters
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Yet another crane collapse was under investigation Friday, two and half months after a deadly crane incident on East 51st street.
The Upper East Side site of Friday morning’s disaster had its share of violations and complaints even before the crane snapped and crashed to the street.
The last complaint happened the day before on Thursday, when someone called to complain of hoisting over the street, which was investigated by the city's Department of Buildings.
In total, the DOB issued the site 14 violations and 22 complaints since last July.
The complaints included a stop work order that was issued on April 22 because the crane failed a load test. A second stop work order was imposed on April 23 because of more problems during a load test.
New York Crane Corporation owns the crane, but it was being operated by the Sorbara Corporation, which was installing concrete on the site. New York Crane Corporation is one of only a handful of companies that rent out large tower cranes, and it owned the crane involved in the deadly crane collapse on East 51st Street this past March.
As part of new processes set up as a result of that incident, the Department of Buildings says it followed several procedures with the latest collapsed crane, including hosting a pre-installation meeting on April 17, observing the erection of the crane on April 20 and 21, as well as jumps, which involve raising the crane, on May 22 and 27.
“I don't think there's anything wrong at DOB. DOB didn't collapse, it was the crane that collapsed,” said Mayor Michael Bloomberg in a Friday press conference at the construction site.
Since January, 16 people have died in construction-related accidents -- more than in all of last year. The incidents led to the resignation of Buildings Commissioner Patricia Lancaster last month, and now the city is trying to figure out what needs to be done to prevent another construction site from turning into another deadly accident scene.
- Michael Scotto
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