The guy in the orange safety shirt (running to the lower-right of the scene) definitely has soiled britches. He misses getting hit by the lifted load, then just misses getting hit by the headache-ball, and then narrowly misses getting ht by the jib. Off to Vegas for him!
BP: I try to always remember eng-tips is international, and I wouldn't want to get in bad graces with Mr. Putin by insinuating this happened in Leningrad. Those folks don't fair so well.
Yeah... I typically stay out of the forensic "CSI" that others enjoy so much (see FIU)... but this looks a lot like the crane was booming down and got outside the chart radius.
Less obvious causes could be an improperly prepared working surface or improper assembly of the crane.
The first guys next to the crane start running before anyone else. They either heard the warning hooters or a yell from the operator.
Does look like the jib lowers a lot more than the crane moves to start with so maybe a failed brake or control gear but then the wire can't keep pace with the jib fall and over it goes.
Looks more like it was set up to lift stuff for the units which are at foundation level and used out of reach.
Remember - More details = better answers
Also: If you get a response it's polite to respond to it.
Looks to me like nothing happened other than overturning the crane- no brake failure, no jib failure. And in that case, just a matter of getting the load too far out. Possibly coupled with wind.
...the pics aren't bad. One shows the lift number which after quick google search, returned 4635 LBS weight so quite a bit more than 1000 lbs quoted in the article.
It seems to pivot over the front right corner. Other videos of those collapsing like the NYC crane show it pivoting straight over the nose. Were the tracks turned in the wrong direction or did the ground give at the right front? Maybe wind did upset it blowing the boom off to the right.
The guy that almost got hit 3 times didn't quite have that run perpendicular to the falling boom thing figured out.
