Originally posted by SLAYER69
How can any City, County, or State not regulate these things?
I mean come on out side of the obvious threat to human life how about the potential for massive property damage?
Yes, it does seem a bit absurd that cities, counties, and states who are complete Nazis about regulating & monitoring 40-ton trucks, would be
unconcerned about 500-ton cranes.
While your outrage is reasonable, everyone needs to wait for the results of the investigations, so we know clearly what happened and why. Who knows,
this could be a case where no amount of government entanglement would have prevented the collapse.
As someone who's worked around construction cranes and refineries, let me tell you that while there are minimum official regulations, there are
STRINGENT jobsite-specific regulations, particularly at refineries.
For starters, nobody wants to be responsible for injury or death. Nobody needs to face the families, OSHA, the lawyers, the courts, the insurers, and
the press after such an incident. These alone are reasons to run a tight ship. Most refineries have extremely strict procedures and policies for
crane operations. The crane and rigging have to be inspected and certified, and the operators need to be trained and certified. Major "picks"
(lifts) have to be engineered, and all picks have to be planned, submitted, and approved by refinery management. Any slop or mistakes will get you
permanently kicked out of the refinery and possibly fined.
Still, there have been WAY too many crane accidents lately, and I have a feeling we're gonna see a big government overreaction and crackdown on
cranes.
