08.08.2007

Big Blue crane settlement

Four workers who suffered post-traumatic stress disorder following the collapse of Lampson’s Big Blue crane in July 1999 have reached an out-of-court settlement with Mitsubishi Heavy Industries and nine other defendants.
See video of the collapse
The four, Joseph L. Edwards Jr, Shayne Olson, Robert D. Becker and Thomas J. Freda, received an undisclosed financial settlement.

The settlement was agreed last week just months before the case was due to go to trial at Milwaukee County Circuit Court. This is thought to be the final legal action taken against those involved with the accident at the Miller Park Baseball stadium.

Olson and Edwards were operating smaller cranes at the site on July 14, 1999, when Big Blue became unstable. Freda was on the roof of the stadium with Becker who is said to be the last person to speak to ironworkers Jeffrey A. Wischer, William R. DeGrave and Jerome W. Starr, who were killed in the accident.

Big Blue was lifting a 450 tonne section of the stadium roof, when it began swaying in the wind eventually causing the crane to collapse.
The three men who died, Wischer, DeGrave and Starr were working from a basket suspended from a crane, around 60 metres up and were hit by falling debris.

The widows of the three received substantial compensation in an earlier settlement.