3 missing after crane collapses into building

RESCUERS in New York city were last night trying to find three people missing after a crane smashed into a townhouse in Manhattan on Saturday afternoon, killing at least four construction workers and injuring 17.

New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg said that two other workers and a woman who was visiting the townhouse remained missing.

The four dead were all believed to be working on a new high-rise condo building, killed on the job in what Mr Bloomberg called one of the city’s worst construction accidents.

“I heard a big crash and I saw dust immediately,” said Maureen Shea, a 66-year-old retired banker who was lying in bed talking on the phone when she glanced out her window and saw bricks raining from the sky.

“I thought the crane was coming in my window.”

The crane split into pieces as it fell, pulverising a four-story townhouse and demolishing parts of five other buildings. Cars were overturned and crushed.

A dust cloud mushroomed over the neighbourhood and rubble was piled several stories high.

“It’s a horrible situation, very gory. There’s blood in the street,” said Lt Gov David Paterson, who is to be sworn in as governor today.

Yesterday, construction crews positioned a second crane to help remove pieces of the white crane that crushed the townhouse, and started removing piles of bricks and debris from the middle of the street.

The crane that fell had stood at least 19 stories high

A piece of steel fell and sheared off one of the ties holding it to a half-built apartment tower causing it to detach and topple, said Stephen Kaplan, owner of the Reliance Construction Group.

“It was an absolute freak accident,” he said.