ON NOVEMBER 16, 2006, THE BELLEVUE (WA) FIRE Department responded to a multiday incident that challenged its resources. The tower crane at the site of the 20-story 333 Building experienced a catastrophic failure. The building, in its early stages of construction, is part of a rapidly growing downtown area where, at the time of my writing this article, about a dozen tower cranes were engaged in building new high-rises. The area already has numerous high-rises, some as high as 42 stories.
在1935小时的塔式起重机完成它busy workday, the operator was “parking” it for the night. Suddenly, bystanders heard a resounding “crack” that reverberated through the downtown streets. The unnerving sound ominously stirred the evening air. The tower crane began a slow, twisting fall to the south from 210 feet in the air. The operator braced for the worst.
At the base of the crane, workers scrambled to get clear while pedestrians on the surrounding streets and other crane operators in nearby cranes looked in horror toward the towering collapse of metal. The three-story Plaza 305 building, immediately to the south of the worksite, felt the initial brunt of the crane’s impact. The crane’s mast (tower section) tore through the office building’s eastern third, making kindling out of the offices and causing a major collapse of the building’s east end. The crane’s machinery arm (counterweight section) impacted the seven-story Civica Office Commons further to the south. Sixth- and seventh-floor offices were punched open before the hefty counterbalance weights broke free from their mountings, falling with a tremendous crash into the alley below. Within the Civica’s interior, glass and debris were flying everywhere.
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