Jun 4, 2008 7:41 pm US/Eastern
Crane Collapse Prompts Oversight Of NYC Industry
To Mandate Crane Training; Sites With Hazardous Histories Assigned Safety Monitors
NEW YORK (CBS) ―
-
-
Firefighters and rescue workers searche through the tangled wreckage.
Most of the Upper East Side residents forced from their homes after Friday's crane collapse are returning to a real mess. City leaders proposed tough new safety rules for construction workers on Wednesday, after the deadly incident took two of their own.
Five days after their nomadic experience began, it was a slow but steady migration home.
"I'm actually glad I can get back in, I mean getting back to our lives is great," said Melissa Damour.
Joe Natale and fiancee Andrea Mantia shot home video of what they returned to - a building beat up on the inside and outside after the crane crumbled onto their building, but at least it's home.
"You don't know what it's like until you actually go through something like this. You're always seeing other people go through things like this," said Joe Natale.
Friday's crane fatality, the city's second in ten weeks, is sparking change in how the city oversees its busy construction industry.
"We are preparing an unprecedented set of reforms that will improve safety throughout the five boroughs," said NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg.
Among the dozen new rules, crane workers will have to take safety courses. Contractors will now be assigned safety control numbers allowing the city to monitor how safe each company is, and work sites with hazardous histories will be assigned a project safety monitor.
"For the first time we will have the ability to track construction at job sites. I can't tell you how important that is," said NYC Buildings Department Acting Commissioner Robert LiMandri.
But some crane contractors will now hire their own independent inspectors out of concerns company and city inspectors don't have the required expertise.
"We believe there's a higher level of technical training to really begin to look at mechanical systems, perhaps of the particular crane, so it's another set of eyes," said Louis Coletta of the Building Trade Employers Association.
Industry experts say the oversight is an important first step, but it may not be enough and more rules may be on the way.
The New York City Council will begin hearings on the new construction rules in the next few weeks.
(© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
2009 Celebrity Deaths, July-Dec.
Click to enlarge
Paterson: NYS Will Be Broke Before Christmas 31 mins ago 
Hempstead Asst Police Chief Alleges Discrimination 34 mins ago 
Stumble It!
Reporting
Comments