04.08.2008

HSE writes to all UK crane companies

The UK’s Health & Safety Executive has written to all UK crane rental companies asking them to “take forward certain actions” which have arisen from the HSE investigation into the fatal collapse of the luffing tower crane in Liverpool in 15 January 2007.

The letter includes its technical report 'Report on technical aspects of HSE's investigation into the collapse of a luffing tower crane at a Liverpool construction site on 15th January 2007' which was revealed at the inquest for Zbigniew Roman Swirzynsk on 8th July which returned a verdict of accidental death. See a series of unfortunate events felled Liverpool crane

The 10 page report goes into much greater detail and highlights the issue of unsatisfactory cable retainers on the luffing jib hoist cable reeving. The full report can be read online or downloaded from the HSE site Just click here to see the full report

HSE's investigation into this fatal incident continues.

Vertikal Comment

The HSE report is very thorough and highlights the fact that at least three events conspired to come together – Short extreme gusts of wind - a fully elevated jib – facing into the direction of the wind – a light get large load - an operator that tried to lower the jib at the point where the jib hoist cables were unloaded – a cable and retaining pins that had sufficient tolerance to allow the cable to jump out of the sheaves and finally a load that hung up as it was elevated.

All occurred in the right or rather the wrong sequence and then the jib dropped far enough to create a large enough dynamic load to rip the top off of the crane and shear two of the tower pins.

The chance of all of these events coming together like this are highly unlikely and both the operator, the dead man and Falcon Crane were extremely unlucky.

The question is does this warrant changes in design or regulation? The fact that it was able to happen says yes it does. And certainly Jaso – the manufacturer needs to look at the designs used by its competitors.

At the same time it is of some concern that the drop of a lightly loaded jib can cause the cranes slew bearing connection to break.

The positive thing here is that this report has come out relatively fast by HSE standards – just 18 months after the event – and it does draw obvious conclusions and has initiated some action.