FDNY: 1 dead, 2 seriously hurt in Manhattan crane collapse

The crane came down shortly before 8:30 a.m., toppling onto the street and spanning more than the entire length of a city block, officials and witnesses said.

“It started getting windy”, Menendez said.

City officials said there were no complaints or violations at the construction site. “And then all of the sudden the wind started picking up and it came straight down”. An unidentified man interviewed as he was leaving Wichs’ apartment building said he was Wichs’ rabbi and told The Daily News Wichs was “an absolute angel”. “I ran. I’m not afraid to tell you, it was terrifying”.

Menendez said that police frantically tried to pull the man out from under the crumpled equipment.

“We saw that the crane was a little bent and it was still all the way up in the sky”. The collapse left one person dead and three injured.

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio said the victim was sitting in a parked auto at the time of the accident, and that it was caused by high winds. “It’s something of a miracle that there was not more of an impact”. “Thank god it was not worse”, he said.

The crane carried the name of the Bay Crane company.

Emergency workers gather at the scene of a crane collapse in the Tribeca section of Manhattan in NY on Friday, Feb.5, 2016.

Friday’s accident was the first crane collapse since 2008, according to de Blasio.

Alfred Simon, a construction worker who was working in a next-door building when the crane fell, said he heard a boom.

“They inched the crane forward”.

She said she had been avoiding the street because the crane seemed unstable.

“[He] started move it forward”, she said. “It didn’t crash, it somersaulted and went upside down”.

Buildings have been evacuated as officials check for structural damage.

Worth Street is in busy downtown Manhattan, a few blocks away from City Hall and other government buildings. Fire Department and Con Edison crews have been sweeping the area every 15 minutes to make sure it’s safe.

The MTA 1 train is bypassing Chambers and Franklin following the collapse. “No work was done this morning because the crew made the decision to bring the crane down to the secure position”. At least three others had non-life-threatening injuries including two with head lacerations, officials said.

Arvanities, who is president of the Safety Professional Association that represents thousands of construction safety managers, got off his stop near Church Street and walked two blocks to the scene on Worth Street.