Investigators have been looking at the nylon strap, used to help place a heavy steel collar on the crane, as a possible culprit in the Saturday's East 51st Street devastating crane collapse, but one veteran construction worker who helped dismantle the collapsed told WNBC.com the crane wasn't "properly anchored to the ground."
The worker "noticed there were no bolts connecting the bottom of the crane tower to a base of steel and concrete beams crisscrossed in an 'H' pattern and built around a Con Ed vault with a transformer underground. There were also no bolts connecting those beams to the street, he said," which could have help stop the crane from falling. A source told WNBC "the engineer who approved the crane assembly chose to straddle the Con Ed vault...bolting is not always an option."
Crane operator Wayne Bleidner was buried yesterday, while funerals were held for construction workers Brad Cohen and Anthony Mazza today. There are still vacate orders on at least 11 buildings. And it's really amazing more people weren't injured (at one point, there were 24 injured) or killed -look out at this photograph of a 20-foot beam that "catapulted" into a townhouse like, as one firefighter said, "a shish kebab."
Update:
WNBC now reports that the inspector who was supposed to check on the crane - after Turtle Bay resident and former contractor Bruce Silberblatt called 311 to complain that the crane was not properly secured (see below) on March 4- has been arrested. The inspector "filed paperwork saying that he inspected the crane -- but he never did."
The Daily News spoke to inspector Edward Marquette after the collapse; though the DOB's records show he visited the crane on March 4, he claimed he never visited the crane that day. And in spite of the arrest, the DOB doesn't want the public to think the false report caused the collapse (because the crane was inspected on March 14 - a day before the collapse).
