Safety

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.

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.

Specialized Carriers & Rigging Association (SC&RA) has launched a free mobile app to access crane hand signals. Signals are shown graphically and all are available in English and Spanish. They comply with the new OSHA Cranes and Derricks Standard, Appendix A to Subpart CC of Part 1926-Standard Hand Signals, SC&RA said.

A crane working on the Kaw Lake dam in north central Oklahoma tipped over the edge into the water yesterday. The operator managed to exit his cab before the crane went over.

A six axle All Terrain crane went over at the Orica Chemicals refinery at Kooragang Island, near Newcastle New South Wales, late last week, after one of its outriggers punched through the ground into some sort of void.

A tree worker fell around 23 metres from a crane yesterday in Bremerton to the west of Seattle Washington. Aaron Bjorn Waag, 28, was apparently suspended from the hook of an All Terrain crane via some sort of harness. He was trimming tree limbs when the harness gave way dropping him to the concrete walkway below.

The crane, a Demag owned by rental company Kran & Shakt had set up with full boom and extensions on a project close to the city’s Central Station to lift glass panels into place on a new building being constructed by Peab.