09.10.2023

Boom lift tips crawler crane

A crawler crane overturning incident in Chile this May, in which a lattice crawler crane overturned while lifting a boom lift, only came in late last week.

The incident occurred at the very start of May at the Manto Verde copper mining operation near Chañaral, in the Atacama region of Chile on the country’s remote northern coast. We understand that the crane operator was uninjured, although he was badly shaken up and bruised.

The crane a midsized Terex was lifting a JLG telescopic boom lift from one part of the site to another, the weight was clearly outside of the cranes capacity, as was clear by the overly careful operating speed. As the operator began to slew the crane it started to 'become light' and then began to tip forward as it lost stability. As the crane tilted forward, the slew motor was unable to hold the superstructure side on to the direction of travel and eventually gave way, the resulting sudden movement caused the boom to collapse. The boom lift was completely destroyed.
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A statement from the local safety authority said: "The incident did not leave any major consequences with only structural damage and the suspension of work at the site the result."

The Mantoverde mine holds one of the largest copper reserves in Chile with estimated reserves of 580 million tonnes of ore. Mitsubishi Materials Corp reportedly paid $236 million to acquire a 30 percent stake in the mine in 2020.

The following video shows the incident live.