New York Crane Collapse Cause, MORE Fatal Collapses

Jeff Ostroff analyzes the July 26, 2023, New York City crane collapse, looking for the root cause of the fire and subsequent collapse of the crane boom. The New York Crane company is also examined, as it was involved in 2 other deadly crane accidents in 2008, resulting in 7 deaths from one crane accident, and 2 deaths in the second one.

00:00 Introduction to NYC Crane Collapse and Fire
01:57 Video of New York Crane Fire from NYFD
03:08 Why FD fire hose streams did not reach the crane fire
04:07 Information on New York Crane Company
04:50 Analysis of NYC crane spec sheet
07:53 NYC Crane Company Involved in 2 prior fatal crane accidents 2008
08:22 Fatal Crane Collapse #1, March 15, 2008
12:39 Fatal New York Crane Collapse #2, May 30, 2008
15:15 NYC Crane collapse Feb 5, 2016

[joefin]

It's the oiler's responsibility to maintain the crane on site. Local 15. You guess a lot in your videos. Things happen.

[mathewritchie]

Many years ago I was told that a series of crain colapses in Perth Western Australia were put down to operator error and then someone looked for commonalities and found that all the operators involved were trained at the same company and the same instructor.He got sacked and all his students were retrained and the problem went away.

[richardross]

The crane collapses that I knew about(1 in the Army, and 3 civilian) all involved overloading. In the Army, it was a Major ordered the the Spec5 to exceed to safe reach and the barge flipped and dumped the crane. The civil ones were all cases of the customer lying about the weight to get a cheaper crane. Most catastrophes have a bunch of errors that lead up to it. When I was called up for Desert Storm, I served with a Major from the Hawaiian National Guard. He told me that they were being flooded with chinesium and they were having a lot of failures. He warned me to watch out for it. Another good video. Good Luck, Rick

[bearez]

I work with cranes almost everyday. Seeing those cranes collapsing is frightening to say the least.

[jupiterjunk]

So sad when accidents like this happen.
My uncle was a tower crane repair man, in California. He was one of the ones that worked on the crane in place, not in a shop, or on the ground. He made a butt tonne of because of the danger, and liability involved.
He gave me two pieces of advice, when it came to cranes.
1.) "If you're not making a living, being near the crane, stay the hell away from them and every place around them. That goes double for one of them." (pointing to a tower crane)
2.) "IF you fail at your job, one of the other guys could get hurt, or god forbid a regular person get's hurt. The second your hand hits that first rung, you inspect as you go. All the way from the bottom up. If you see ANYTHING, you note it and go back down immediately, and report it. And your @$$ better not even THINK of going back up until the problem is fixed properly AND... to your satisfaction."
.
R.I.P. Uncle Johnny, and save some Scotch for the rest of us.

[kmlb]

As someone who has worked with construction equipment and farm equipment sometimes a hydraulic hose can burst unexpectedly with no warning, especially if moving a heavy load and applying high forces to the hydraulics.

[bobbarclay]

I worked on building steel towers. On one job it was convenient to use a crane to hoist completed 20' sections onto an existing tower. I was on the tower top putting in the bolts into each new section as it came up.
One section started swinging a bit wild due to 0:06 sudden wind gusts that were getting nasty. As I wrangled the first bolt in place the ground workers let me know about lightning. I heard the boom and saw a flash, and I started climbing down like a scared squirell.
We left to get under cover during a horrendous storm. When we next looked out the tower section and crane were at seemingly impossible angles, and the rigging had fouled everything.
The crane was up to its axles in mud and tilted a bit. The operator had set 3 wheels in 2 different swales, and the downpour buried the crane in mud. 0:06

[iseeyou]

45 degrees give you the longest trajectory with 0 air resistance, the ideal angle with a water hose would be a lot less where wind is also a factor as well.
It's not exactly difficult maths to factor in air resistance either, I did it in high school.

[markknister]

Not corruption??? In NYC? How COULD it be??

[JamieMcgee]

Amusement Park rides are a problem this summer, too.

[jbrock]

Please continue this video including the Seattle crane collapse in April 27 2019. I was told by a construction worker that the giant bolts that hold it in place at the base, were taken up too early while dismantling it. Also the wind was a factor. Would love to hear your explanation.

[lindsayrixon]

Thanks Jeff, always interesting to see the nuts and bolts behind these mechanical failures.

[el.aye.bee.]

Great video. You're on point with just about everything you spoke about. I work in construction in NYC. We work with and erect and assemble and disassemble lots of these cranes, from the smallest cherry-picker to the tallest tower cranes. We are still yet to determine what started the fire, it could be anything, of course, but you are right. The damage done to the main cable on the boom was the problem. Right after this latest collapse (thank God, no one was killed) I got on a social media chat with some of my union brothers that have a lot more experience than I do in the tower crane department...and one of the first things that came up was the fact that Lomma cranes was involved, yet again. The corruption levels of this company are well-known in the industry...and we always talk in hushed tones about the corruptibility of DOB inspectors as well. Even the fact that Lomma got off in the criminal case has been alleged to have been corruption. I wouldn't doubt it.
Regarding the crane that collapsed in that bonus footage, everything you said was exactly how it happened. The crane operator started lowering the jib too fast and with the wrong angle on the boom. The only other thing I might add is that the one victim that died, word on the street is that he was told not to walk into a restricted area, and he (allegedly) flipped the bird to the flaggers on duty and did so anyway. Allegedly. Condolences to his family all the same, and may he R.I.P.

[harmlesscreationsofthegree]

It seems crazy that there isn’t some sort of mandatory fire suppression system near the fuel and engine compartments 😮

[freelectron]

as a crane operator i can tell you that your more likely to get hit by lightening than hit by a falling crane.
also its very common for cranes to be operating right on the edge of stability limits, and to a degree but less common, structual limits.
every day someone will ask you to do something thats beyond your reach or capacity. without doubt. sometimes you do it when experience tells you you can get away with it, and some times you have to put your foot down and say no. and almost everytime its the foreman or someone in an office telling you to do it.
crane load charts are very conservative. lifting %110 of your capacity is usually fine, but its the extra factors that make it dangerous and why the load charts exist.
wind on the boom de-rates everything. this is one of many unseen factors that can compound the error and give you the accidents you see.

[johntankson]

Thanks Jeff, always good to see and hear you give your thoughts and reviews on our every day comings and goings. No smoke and mirrors here, very informative as always. Please keep the great content coming.

[thezanzibarbarian]

_"What Caused 2023 New York Crane Collapse?"_
He was old and tired. Regardless of how many times he was rubbed down and repainted _(Though he liked the rubbing down bit!), _ there comes a time when a crane stops and thinks,
_"Can I really go on with this for another year? Build myself up. Lift this here. Place this there. Lift that there. Put it there. All day long and for weeks on end. Then it's dismantle myself and back into some storage for god knows how long. And then there's the wind when I can't do anything. And then there are the holiday's for my keepers. They go and leave me here. especially at winter. Covered in ice and snow while they're having parties in warm houses."_
So this old fella... This old crane we've seen... He just got tired of life. He thought he'd have to stop.
*_But he just wanted to go out in a spectacular way. Which he did._*
And try hot to hurt anyone in doing so. Which he didn't quite manage to do. _But then... After all... He was just an old crane._

[whoever]

I was in the fire department when I was younger and they didn't teach us anything about the angle of the water coming out of the hose. However, I also worked for a department that didn't have any really tall buildings or many instances where just the pressure available to us wouldn't be enough to easily reach the fire. Also, literally all the fires I fought were wild land fires and we did medical calls around town other than that.

The other thought I had is that perhaps that lower line was trying tower down the building onto which that crane was anchored so that the fire wouldn't spread to the building. In fact, I'm almost certain that they would be putting water on the building because that's something we do if we can to keep fire from spreading from one house to another and also on brush to slow the fire down and help us contain it when it's a wild fire. This still doesn't explain the other hose other than perhaps there being a lack of communication between the drone operators and the firefighters on the roof aiming the hose line since it may have appeared to all of them that they were hitting it. They would have been aiming at the base of the fire since you have to do that to put it out. If you just aim at the flames above the thing that is on fire, all you'll do is make a bunch of steam. I wouldn't be surprised if the firefighters aiming the hose thought they were hitting the base of the fire from their angle. Hopefully, word got through from the drone pilot that they needed to aim higher.

[robertporterfield]

Two points:
Point 1: Cranes are one of the simplest machines found on a construction site. Even so, I've been amazed over the years at how often they are involved in accidents. There is no end to people's ability to screw up a lift. This includes the ever-present mobile crane and bridge cranes.

Point 2: A hose stream does not act like a projectile in flight. Even a well-formed hose stream will begin to splinter as it gets further and further from the nozzle. To get optimum reach a suitable nozzle with the water being supplied to the nozzle at optimum pressure is needed. If, for example, the pressure is less than optimum the stream will begin to splinter much sooner and will have less reach. Once splintering starts to occur, range will quickly be reduced.

[melaneymattson]

I love these analysis videos that you do. You are so smart Jeff!! Thanks, Melaney from SoCal