Thursday, July 31, 2008

July 31st, 2008


Aspen Colorado. Swinerton Construction noticed metallic cracking in a tower crane in use on one of their projects. The crane was close to being dismantled so they have stopped using the crane altogether. It sounds as if Swinerton is taking the lessons of crane collapses seriously and this is a breath of fresh air in an industry concerned about schedules.
The crane is owned by Lewis Equipment.



Tuesday, July 29, 2008

June ? 2008




Voronezh Russia, Tower crane on traveler tips with the cab tilting and ejecting the operator even though the crane did not fully collapse. The operator was a woman which may be a first for this blog.
I would ask two things... how many cross base cranes have we lost in the last few years, and are we balasting them enough? Age may have no bearing on this accident, but how old is this crane? Why is the civilized world running cranes this old? The engineering on the size of the base is beyond me, but it seems that shock loading may not be taken into account when designing these bases. I've seen modern cranes on outriggers get light on the outriggers due to light shock loading on a self-erector. Adding balast or five feet of spread seems like it would be easy enough to get away from pushing the envelope.

Wednesday, July 23, 2008

January 30th, 2008


Dubai Potain luffing crane collapsed during a concrete bucket pour.

Boom rope inspection? Were the limits working? Weld failure? Boom winch failure.

Unknown Date


Germany Structural failure of self erector. This might be a first to see a structural failure of the entire jib without collapse. Of course Edmonton Alberta had a outer jib failure, but this is a first with a total jib collapse. They were bucket pouring concrete at the time.

Unknown Date


Germany This was a first for me. A Mobile Tower crane collapsed. It landed on a number of cars. I can't say that I know enough about truck mounted tower cranes. They are common in Europe but in the US we generally haven't had them. I've often heard of axel weight issues but I think that those issues are fixed at this time. Will someone give me 2 million dollars so that I can buy one and go to work with it? This particular one is a Liebherr and the truck frame was horizontal and on it's outriggers.

Unknown Date

















I hate saying unknown date but you'll see a number of him in a short span here since I was searching for accidents in languages that I don't speak. Olimpia Brazil. Look at the lacing design on this. The design is terrible. you have welds in shear instead of compression and tension. Then you look at the trolley and it looks homemade. Is it even from the factory design? Does it say a lot about the set up and maintenance of this crane? I have a feeling that Mitsubishi wagon was totaled but the crane probably wasn't.

colapso do guindaste de torre

Unknown Date






















Dusseldorf Germany. Self erector drops on a car. The car is a Czech car called a Skoda. If we were speaking in Czech you could say "a skoda" too which translates to a pity. Yes, the Czech people chose "pity" as the name of their national car. But I don't know any German so I know nothing about this accident.

Unknown Date


Ground problems in Brazil left a sink hole that I'm sure damaged cars and maybe injured people. Notice the lean to the under mined tower crane? I can't find anything that says it fell over but I wouldn't go up it to dismantle it. I might place remote controlled explosives on the soil for a good show...

colapso do guindaste de torre

Unknown Date


Self Erector in Germany. Is it me or does Germany have quite a few accidents?

Unknown Date


Looks like a 77 EC Collapsing during dimantle. Did the building and crane manage to hold it up? Crazy photo from Germany

April 13th, 2008







Brazil Climb goes wrong. Looking at how the superstructure split the tower section, it makes me wonder if while climbing the crane the lacing or dogs failed alowing the crane gain speed falling blowing through the lacings. Of course that's impossible according to 9-11 conspiracy theorists. The collapse stops at the tie-in collar and the superstructure folds around the tower. Obviously if a operator was present he didn't survive, but since I don't speak Portugese I don't have any details.

colapso do guindaste de torre

March 1st, 2008






Crane on a traveller tips in Czech Republic. The crane has ballast, level is generally set by the rails... There must be a great story behind this one.

věžový jeřáb nehoda, věžový jeřáb kolaps

February 20th, 2008


Liebherr K Crane tips in Germany

February 19th, 2008


Mexico crane on a cross base collapsed. Appears to have been ballasted and tipped due to stability issues.





















colapso de la torre de la grúa

May 30th, 2007


Germany, Self erector on what appears to be solid ground.

September 30th 2005


A Self erector tipped into a house. Level, good soils, adequate matting, enough counter weight? Website is in German. I found a number of these just finding the word for crane and collapse or accident in various languages. German = Kran Unfall

Sunday, July 20, 2008

May 22nd 2007







Treviso Italy Liebherr 63 on what appears to be a factory cross base. Counterweights are present, yet the crane tipped and landed in the roof of a house. In the world of tower cranes this is a tiny crane and so the house was able to stop the fall. Unfortunately I don't speak any Italian so the pictures and video were as far as I could get in terms of knowledge.






Three posibilities are immediately obvious. The crane wasn't erected plumb. The soils weren't checked, or it lacked the proper amount of counter weight. Without more information available, that's the best that I got for ya.

Wednesday, July 9, 2008

January 30th 2007


Zhejiang Province China. Tower Crane collapse. ! worker dead and accident was under investigation. Link

Tuesday, July 1, 2008

April 1st, 2002




Taipei 101, worlds tallest building for a time was struck by a 6.8 earthquake when the building was being constructed on the 56th floor. Four Favelle Favco's were being used at the time. Two of the cranes were shaken loose from their anchorages and plumeted to the ground killing 5 and injuring many. I've seen video of the collapse on television and it's incredible, but I've never been able to find a link on the internet. At the end of the day, earth quakes of substantial size have the ability to take down cranes. Especially if they are being bottom climbed and rely on the strength of the building itstself for support and have minimal clearances between floors and mast sections.
Here is the link to the story.


http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/front/archives/2002/04/01/130035/print

I finally found a link to the video and had to post a new post to add it. See August 15th 2008 posting.