Ernie Pierini

The company was preparing to re-roof the building, but when the operator raised the first pack of materials, the crane lost stability and tipped, coming to rest against the leading edge of the building.

Food for Thought is our way of sharing interesting concepts on corporate leadership and management with others who might find it useful. The thoughts offered are intended to be controversial and thought provoking. They always follow our motto of helping develop logical leadership.

A couple of our readers have sent us information and photographs of the new 3,600 tonne Sany SCC86000TM crawler crane. The crane looks like a combination of the Terex CC8800 Twin and Manitowoc’s model 31000. It uses a twin boom and twin derrick mast but employs four sets of tracks in a similar way to the Manitowoc. We are still lacking a great deal of detail, but some of the photos we have seen show a four tracked carriage which looks as though it might be a super-lift counterweight carrier.

I get a ton of emails asking to solve sales dilemmas. Here are a few that may relate to your job, your life, and (most important) your sales thought process right now:

Whatever words you use to describe U2’s 360° stage, just don’t call it small. On Sunday, a crew of hundreds used cranes, booms and lifts to erect four arched, metal spikes — the skeleton of a light show leviathan that takes four days to build. Time lapse video attached.

Working in construction sites has always been considered as hazardous. In the period between 1997 and 1999, there were 158 accidents which can be considered as crane-related. 73 percent of these crane related accidents involved mobile cranes. Of this number, 10 accidents were caused by electrical contact. This gives people the importance of electrical grounding of mobile cranes.

A new time-lapse video from London’s Olympic park shows the erection of the Arcelor/Mittal Orbit and the vast variety of cranes and work platforms used in the construction of this 115 metre high structure.

A young Rough Terrain crane operator died earlier this week in Arizona, when the crane ran-away’ and overturned. The operator,28, was driving the crane, described as a 100 ton Rough Terrain – although it is substantially smaller – down a dirt track in a granite quarry in Congress, to the North West of Phoenix Arizona.

A reader sent us in a good example that occurred this week on a job site at Southmead hospital, Bristol in the UK. While it does not directly involve a crane or work platform the cautionary tale is equally relevant.

A concrete pump was in action on the site and appeared to have been set properly and according to the contractor’s – Carillion – safety requirements.

We finally have the information on the crane that went over in late April at a CNRL (Canadian Natural Resources Ltd) facility in Alberta. We understand that it is the Horizon oil Sands Project in Fort McMurray. The crane, a seven axle Liebherr LTM1400-7.1 owned by Mammoet, was apparently being driven into position to work on a flare stack- fully rigged with luffing jib, boom retracted and raised to full elevation.