Before this gets ugly, my understanding of the precipitating factor was high wind gusts. I know the mayor will carry out a thorough investigation and there will be facts presented to the public. There is criticism already regarding the fact with crane disassembly the streets should be closed around the building. That is difficult to do in a city with 59 cranes working.
One thing is sure, the climate crisis has many faces and impacts the USA in profound ways with deaths and tragedy occurring all the time. There needs to be a comprehensive federal policy that searches for problems before they happen. This may OR may not be caused by unusually high winds and there maybe other contributing factors; but; the USA has denied these issues far, far too long.
I have no doubt there will be fault assigned in the city's investigation, but, because there is no COMPULSORY demand to overlay a climate crisis potential to this tragedy it will go undetected. The federal government agencies are not tapped to be included in these investigations when it comes to climate. That is a huge mistake and the USA continues to make the same mistakes over and over.
One thing is sure, the climate crisis has many faces and impacts the USA in profound ways with deaths and tragedy occurring all the time. There needs to be a comprehensive federal policy that searches for problems before they happen. This may OR may not be caused by unusually high winds and there maybe other contributing factors; but; the USA has denied these issues far, far too long.
I have no doubt there will be fault assigned in the city's investigation, but, because there is no COMPULSORY demand to overlay a climate crisis potential to this tragedy it will go undetected. The federal government agencies are not tapped to be included in these investigations when it comes to climate. That is a huge mistake and the USA continues to make the same mistakes over and over.
Seattle is one of the nation’s leaders in the number of cranes that operate in the city.
Rider Levett Bucknall, an international firm that tracks the number of cranes in major cities, said that Seattle has 59 cranes as of January 2019. That is more than any other United States city, but trails Toronto, which has 104 cranes.
According to the Associated Press, Seattle also topped the charts for number of cranes in the United States in 2018 with 65.
Seattle had 58 cranes at one point in 2016, according to the Seattle Times.
While it may have a high number of cranes, deaths stemming from crane-related incidents seem rare. According to Occupational Safety and Health Administration data from 2009-2017, no deaths from crane incidents were reported in Seattle....
