1 dead, 2 seriously hurt in Manhattan crane collapse

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio speaks Friday at a news conference.

At least one person was killed and three others were injured when a crane collapsed in Manhattan Friday, authorities said.

Soon after the accident happened, around 8:30 a.m., Tribeca streets were flooded with police and fire fighters with a command center being set up in a Chase bank on Church Street and Worth Street.

The crane’s operators were in the process of lowering and securing it amid adverse weather conditions including heavy snow, when it collapsed lengthwise down Worth Street in lower Manhattan, he said.

Local media reported that many streets in the area were closed, and emergency responders were searching cars for persons who may be trapped inside, according to the New York Times.

Robert Harold said he also saw a person lying motionless in the street.

It was not immediately clear whether the strong winds played a role in the collapse.

Crane safety came under scrutiny in the city in 2008, when two tower cranes collapsed in Manhattan within two months of each other, killing a total of nine people.

Bisnow has a reporter on the scene, which is an array of crushed cars and streets littered with debris from the collapse. Fire officials say that four buildings were damaged.

De Blasio said building inspectors had visited the site on Thursday, checked the crane in advance of the project’s next phase and found no problems.

The crane, which was being used at a building and fell from a height of 20 stories, fell to the ground for unknown reasons and landed on several parked vehicles.

Workers were trying to bring the crane down to secure it because of wind gusts when it toppled, according to the mayor.

The street was blocked off for at least 3 blocks and nearby buildings were evacuated.

“Thank God it was not worse”, de Blasio said. There are some 376 of this type of crane, called a “crawler crane”, in use throughout the NYC, and de Blasio has ordered all of them to be lowered and secured in the wake of today’s incident.

A person answering the phone at the office of Bay Crane in the borough of Queens would not discuss the accident or confirm that the crane belonged to the company.