23.05.2011

Boom lift halts Spider-Man

Filming of Spider-Man 4 was halted in Manhattan today when a boom lift the crew was using broke down.

Three crew members were up in the large boom lift in Market Street, Chinatown, preparing for the shoot, when the engine apparently failed, trapping them around 18 metres up. Unable to get down they had to wait for the New York Fire Department to arrive with a ladder platform.
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The stuck crew in Chinatown, New York

The three were eventually transferred from the boom lift to the ladder platform and returned to the ground over two hours after the lift had broken down.
Spider-Man 4, which stars Andrew Garfield, Sally Field, Dennis Leary, and Emma Stone, has been shooting in New York City this month.
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The crew transfer from their boom lift to the fire ladder-platform

Vertikal Comment

It was good to see that the film workers were kitted out with decent harnesses and seemed to know what they were doing in the platform, however it was also clear that they, nor anyone who came to rescue them, had a clue of how to use the machines emergency descent feature.

And which boom lift was it? Let’s just say it looked very much like a large orange and cream machine. Given the crew’s apparent ignorance and lack of planning the unit may simply have run out of fuel?