18.06.2008

New crane safety regs proposed

New York City’s Department of Buildings will propose a series of new crane safety regulations within the next few weeks, the agency’s Acting Commissioner Robert LiMandri said yesterday.

The department is studying various models of crane regulation and conferring with safety experts including those at the federal Occupational Safety & Health Administration to develop the proposals.

There is a particular focus on examining a crane’s maintenance and repair records, Mr. LiMandri said while speaking at BuildingsNY 2008, a real estate trade show. He said that the city is also looking at the technology and equipment that exists to test a crane’s safety.

Last month’s crane collapse on the Upper East Side that killed two people has been linked to a defective weld made to repair the crane.

Mr. LiMandri said that the DOB and OSHA are conducting a forensic examination of what caused that crane collapse, but that the city can’t afford to wait for the results of that study to take action and improve safety.

The city has already announced that all individual parts of a tower crane must be inspected by an independent third party before the crane is assembled. The company inspecting the part can’t have any connection to the engineers that are devising the operational plan for the crane.

California, which is widely believed to have the toughest crane regulations in the country, requires that all tower cranes undergo an annual complete mechanic inspection by an independent firm.