Crane Collapse

By CBS

A nineteen story crane toppled from New York construction site into several apartment buildings, at least four people were killed.

Published: Sat, March 15, 2008 - 10:12 pm
Last Updated: Sat, March 15, 2008 - 10:35 pm

It's a scene reminiscent of 9-11 ..captured on a cell phone on New York's east
side. With buckets in hand and stretchers at the ready, hundreds of rescue
crews dig through the rubble of a building crushed underneath a giant metal
crane...in what the mayor calls one of the worst construction accidents the
city has ever seen.

Jeannie Squeri says she left the building just before the crane began its
tremendous descent from where it was perched atop this construction site to
her building one block away. Several construction workers are dead and many
more people critically injured.

"I just thank God that I'm alive!" said Squeri.

The crane fell so quickly and the noise was so loud, many residents around
here feared they were in the middle of a terrorist attack.

"The noise itself was tremendous," said Mike Geli. "I thought it was an airplane or
something again, but thankfully it wasn't."

The 19 -story crane broke in half as fell...the bottom chunk leaning
precariously against an apartment building...

Neighbors have been concerned about the construction project for
months...complaining to the building department that it was an accident
waiting to happen.

15:50:01 The crane was not properly attached to the building it was
constructing," said Bartle Bull, a witness.

"The crane actually had been inspected and the permits were there
for what they were doing," said New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg.

With crews putting themselves in harms way and countless left homeless...
there will be no sleep here as the clean up begins and the search goes on.
In New York City, Wendy Gillette for CBS News.