NYC Crews at the Scene of Dangling Crane

[News]

A crane is dangling off a 65-story building.

A crane dangles from the top of a building on W. 57th Street. (Screenshot from NBC NY video)

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[Just Plain Ruff]

Whatever bright star who decided to leave the crane up there in 95 mile per hour winds might be looking for another job about now.

[ERDoc]

I don't think it is one of those thing that is easy to get down, but I could be wrong. Those kind of cranes are attached to the building and take a long time to set up, I imagine they take even longer to take down.

[Just Plain Ruff]

I think that it may be one that could be folded but yes you may be right. But if it is one that could be removed oy vey

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[paramedicmike]

I think it looks like it can be folded simply because the wind folded it and not because it was designed to be folded. I think Doc's right on this one.

[Just Plain Ruff]

Yeah, I was talking to a crane guy who says that there are several types of cranes that are placed on tops of buildings like this one.

He said that the one that collapsed is probably not one designed to be folded but he can't be sure based on the pictures but there are several other models that can be folded. He hopes that all of those cranes on tops of any building in the path of this storm have been secured but he says that he will bet his next paycheck that about 25% of them have not been.

He says that more than likely it's going to take another crane to be brought in to remove it or a specialty team of guys and gals to come in and dissasemble this crane from the tip up in order to bring it down safely, unless mother nature does it for them.

Let's hope that it can be done safely.

[ERDoc]

One of the news networks is talking with a crane expert. He says those cranes are supposed to act like weather vanes in the wind and thinks something was set incorrectly when the crane was last used (his speculation of course). He seems to think that they will need to strap the broken part (of a lack of a better way to describe it) to the rest of the structure until they can erect a new crane to safely lower the damaged one.

[Chief1C]

All the better reason to live in a community where no structure is higher than three stories.