27.09.2012

A Lucky escape

A man using in boom lift in Hilversum, the Netherlands had a lucky escape yesterday after a wheel of his machine dropped into a void.
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The lift went over as the wheel dropped into the hole and the boom came to rest in a tree

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From the other side

The man was operating the Genie S-85* - rented from Gunco - just off of a busy road, working at a height of around 13 metres or so when one of the front wheels punched through the block surface and into a large void.
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With a drain nearby it is quite clear that this area had underground voids

The machine, which weighs over 16 tonnes*, tipped over sideways, with the counterweight coming to rest on the ground, while the platform landed in a tree. The operator did not appear to have been wearing a harness and was very lucky in the way the lift fell and the fact that it was cushioned in the branches of the tree.
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The boomlift landed on its counterweight

He was later rescued by the fire service using a rescue platform. The machine was extracted from its hole by a large wrecker with loader crane and appeared to be relatively undamaged. A lucky escape all round.
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The unit is extracted and is showing few signs of any damage

Vertikal Comment

This could have been a very very nasty incident, thankfully no one was hurt, the depth and size of the hole probably helped as did the tree, otherwise the operator could have ended up in the street along with the machine and who know how many pedestrians and cars they might have taken out?

This type of interlocking blocks does provide a very solid and generally reliable surface, but only when well laid on solid ground. With drainage grids present it was clear … if only the ground had been walked… that voids were an issue. It probably wasn’t the best machine for the job. Hopefully lessons have been learnt.

* corrected after we were corrected - we initially took this to be an S-65 - sloppy journalism on our part!