Crane topples into street, killing 1
Equipment falls across Manhattan intersection; 3 hurt.
— A huge construction crane being lowered to safety in a snow squall plummeted onto a Lower Manhattan street Friday, killing a Wall Street worker and leaving three people hurt by debris that scattered as the rig’s lengthy boom fell, officials said.
Stretching almost a block, it landed across an intersection, smashing several car roofs. The accident at a historic building about 10 blocks north of the World Trade Center occurred during the morning rush hour.
Robert Harold heard a crashing sound as the rig fell right outside his office window at the Legal Aid Society.
“You could feel the vibration in the building,” said Harold, who recounted seeing onlookers try- ing to rescue someone trapped in a parked car and seeing a person lying motionless on the street. After the collapse, the crane’s big cab lay upsidedown in the snow with its tank-like tracks pointed at the sky.
The collapse killed David Wichs, a mathematical whiz who worked at a computerized trading firm, his family said. Born in Prague, he had immigrated to the United States as a teenager and graduated from Harvard University, said his sisterin-law, Lisa Guttman.
“He really created a life for himself. He literally took every opportunity he could find,” she said through tears.
Mayor Bill de Blasio initially said the person killed in the collapse was in a car, but police later said he was on the sidewalk. De Blasio said two people were seriously injured, while a third suffered more minor injuries.
A bystander video taken through a window high above the ground showed the arm descending, then taking the entire crane to the ground.
The accident happened as workers were trying to secure the crane against 20 mph winds by lowering the boom, which had been extended to as long as 565 feet the day before, officials said. Because the crane was being lowered, workers were directing pedestrians away from it on a street that otherwise would likely have been teeming with people.
“Thank God we didn’t have more injuries and lose more people,” de Blasio said. “It’s something of a miracle that there was not more of an impact.”
Officials were working to determine why the crane fell.
Capable of lifting 330 tons, the rig had been working for about a week to replace air conditioning equipment and generators on the roof of 60 Hudson St., a 425-foottall, Jazz Age skyscraper, officials said. City building inspectors had been at the site Thursday because the boom was being extended so it could reach farther onto the roof, de Blasio said.
Buildings Commissioner Rick Chandler said inspectors found no problems then with the crane but would investigate further.
The building’s owners declined to comment.
Crane safety came under scrutiny in the city after two tower cranes collapsed in Manhattan within two months of each other in 2008, killing a total of nine people. The accidents spurred fueled new safety measures, but there have been a number of crane accidents in the city over the years since.