A fatal crane incident occurred in Miami, Florida, on Saturday when the boom of a 180 tonne crane buckled and dropped its load, resulting in the death of one man, while four others were injured, two of them seriously.
The incident occurred at the HCA Florida Mercy Hospital where the crane - a 180 tonne, five axle Tadano ATF 180G-5 from the Sims Crane & Rental fleet - was helping with renovation work. Two of the injured were taken to a specialist trauma centre in a serious but stable condition, while the other two were treated on site.
The hospital was largely unaffected.
The crane was working with its 60 metre boom almost fully extended and topped by around 25 metres of its 37.2 metres of luffing extension. We have received no details or indication of what happened, but what we can see is that the top/fly section of the six section boom buckled, something usually related to excessive sideloading, most often inflicted by extreme load swings/crane out of level or high winds.
OSHA officials joined the local police investigating the cause of the incident.
We will update this item when we learn more.
The following news bulletins provide more information from the scene.
Red
hairy........not so fast. With the tip section folded in half, the telescope/retract mechanism could be damaged. I'm pretty sure the computer runs the boom in/out and with the apparent damage it might not want to work.
One might have to lower the boom enough to remove the jib, then lower the boom to the ground and start removing/ cutting sections to where the crane could be moved.
Whatever procedure is selected, it will take another large crane to recover/retrieve the damaged crane.
Red
hairy........not so fast. With the tip section folded in half, the telescope/retract mechanism could be damaged. I'm pretty sure the computer runs the boom in/out and with the apparent damage it might not want to work.
One might have to lower the boom enough to remove the jib, then lower the boom to the ground and start removing/ cutting sections to where the crane could be moved.
Whatever procedure is selected, it will take another large crane to recover/retrieve the damaged crane.
(In my humble opinion)
hairy
Just pull the boom in and chop the bended section off.
Harry Sharp
In an incident like this how would the crane be recovered?