Crane Safety

On November 8, 2010, OSHA’s update to the Cranes & Derricks standard (1926.400) went into effect. Although some of the provisions have delayed effective dates ranging from one year to four, there are a few important updates that were effective on November 8th.

A strong risk assessment and planning, combined with a sharp operator saved a big crawler from tipping over. The crane, a 1,200 tonne Liebherr LTR11200 telescopic belonging to Karl Hartinger Kranbetrieb of Rimbeck-Warburg in Germany, was working on new wind farm being erected on moorland with a peat bog substrate.

Singapore’s High Court has held a structural/mechanical engineer liable in a civil suit for the collapse of a tower crane that killed three people. Engineer Tan Juay Pah, who is also an authorised crane inspector, will have to pay damages to crane supplier Lee Tong Boon, who in turn has to compensate the main contractor Kimly Construction for the accident.

The U.S. Department of Labor has agreed a settlement with Baton Rouge, Louisiana based MMR Contractors and global construction engineer Fluor, regarding the illegal termination of an employee who raised crane safety concerns.

A reader from New Zealand has sent us a very unusual photo of a homemade crane mounted on a trailer. There is not much we can say about it really except there must be more to this, it looks like the result of some challenge to build a crane out of wood and rope.

A large façade scaffold collapsed in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia on Monday, killing at least three, after it was reportedly struck by a crane. The scaffold was on the front of the Princess Noura bin Abdul Rahman Women’s College, currently under construction.

A crawler crane operator died at JaxPort in Jacksonville, Florida on Saturday in an accident that occurred while dismantling a large port crane that had been retired and sold. The old container/gantry crane had been purchased by a company that employed a contractor to dismantle and remove it from the port.

A four axle All Terrain crane tipped over and trapped the operator yesterday at an old phosphate plant in north Manatee County, Florida.

Multiquip will launch the world’s first hydrogen fuel cell powered lighting tower at the World of Concrete exhibition, being held in Las Vegas on 18-21 January. The company said it is the first of a series of fuel cell powered products that it will launch.

A runaway container crane on Darwin’s East Arm wharf in Australia’s Northern Territory crashed into a crawler crane earlier this week causing serious damage. The accident occurred overnight when exceptional winds – said to be over 120kph.