11.07.2007

Falling into the ****

A truck crane working on a building site in Taurenaga, New Zealand had just started lifting steel roof trusses early on Tuesday morning when the ground appeared to swallow it up.

It turned out that the 50 tonne Kato NK500 truck crane, owned by Titan crane hire had been working over an old septic tank which collapsed as the pressure on the cranes outriggers increased.

No one was injured in the incident but the crane's boom hit the top of the three-storey building being constructed, damaging a wall and destroying scaffolding.

The boom also suffered extensive damage and had to be cut up, while the cranes hook narrowly missed traffic on the main Cameron road.
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Two cranes and a lift were used to extract the stricken crane

Titan said that it had not known about the tank, which was concealed beneath asphalt next to the building site. Regional manager Russell Richardson said the tank was not on any plans of the area and was possibly 70 years old.

He also said that several motorists had stopped in surprise when they saw the crane's hook hit Cameron Rd, but it was relatively quiet at the time and no vehicles were hit.

A 60 and an 80-tonne crane were brought in to extract the crane from the tank along with a Genie boom lift.