[kellyhound]

Seattle’s construction frenzy turned deadly Saturday afternoon when a tower crane working on a new Google campus fell like a thunderbolt from the roof of a South Lake Union building, smashing into six cars and killing four people.

Two ironworkers who were in the crane and two people in separate cars were dead by the time Seattle firefighters got to the site at Fairview Avenue North and Mercer Street around 3:30 p.m., fire officials said. Four others were injured.

Three of them — a 25-year-old woman and her 4-month-old daughter, and a 27-year-old man — were taken to Harborview Medical Center. Remarkably, none of them suffered life-threatening injuries, said hospital spokeswoman Susan Gregg.

The fourth victim was treated by medics at the scene. The mother and the baby were discharged late Saturday.

The state Department of Labor and Industries is investigating the cause of the accident, which was not known Saturday night.

Several witnesses and the National Weather Service reported a storm squall with powerful gusting winds moved through the area at the time the crane was being dismantled, then toppled.

“It was terrifying,” said Esther Nelson, a biotech research assistant who was working in a building nearby and saw the crane fall from a break-room window.

“I looked up. The wind was blowing really strong,” she recalled. She saw boats struggling on Lake Union. Then the crane — she estimated it was maybe eight or nine stories high — broke in half.

https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle...as-terrifying/

[dragonme666]

Damn dude in the crane didn't have a chance.

[rockettemorton]

Originally Posted by dragonme666 ↗

Damn dude in the crane didn't have a chance.

Yeah that seems like a pretty terrifying way to go out, especially considering it was probably in the back of their mind the whole time they were up there.

[William May]

I have heard that the crew (Who were disassembling the crane to bring it down from the building site) pulled some of the lock pins out that secured the crane vertical structure. I don't know if that's the case or not. There will be an NTSB report on it, but it will probably take a year or so.