CraneAccident: Oshkosh, Wis.

July 2012—UPDATED—A truck driver was killed and a crane operator seriously injured when one of two cranes lifting a 52-ton precast concrete girder for a new bridge collapsed. The accident occurred when two cranes sitting on barges had nearly placed the 104,000-pound girder. A county sheriff’s department report says the operator of the second crane said that when the girder was nearly in place, the now-collapsed crane needed to be moved slightly to complete the lift, and that its barge was moving parallel to the bridge when the accident happened. The falling crane boom struck and killed the truck driver, who had just delivered the girder and was rolling up wires near the rear of his vehicle. When the crane tipped over, its operator was thrown out onto barge deck and severely injured. OSHA is investigating – www.thenorthwestern.com