Fire Products

N.C. firefighters rescue crane operator after fall into trench

By Beth Velliquette
The Herald-Sun, Durham, N.C.

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. — Chapel Hill and Durham rescue teams lifted a construction worker out of a deep trench to safety Wednesday afternoon after a crane he was operating tipped over, spilling him into the hole.

The man was conscious and talking throughout the rescue, which took nearly two hours since equipment had to be transported from Durham to shore up the dirt walls of the hole before rescuers could go down to help him.

"When he fell, he hurt his back," said Dawn White, a paramedic with the Durham Fire Department.

White laid on the edge of the trench and talked to the man while he was in the hole. "He really wasn't trapped," she said. "There was really nothing holding him, other than his injury."

Because he had hurt his back he wasn't able to get up and climb out of the hole on his own, she said.

"I was just talking to him, trying to keep him calm," she said. "When you're 14 feet deep in the hole, and you've got 50 people running around on top of you, you get a little nervous."

The worker — whose name was not released — was able to answer questions about his condition, as White monitored his condition from the top of the hole.

The worker was using the crane that was attached to a flatbed truck to put a large cement manhole into the trench at the end of McCauley Street and behind the UNC power plant. The crane was hauling a concrete vault as part of an electrical duct bank project. The weight of the cement box apparently caused the truck and crane to turn over, causing the man to slide off the flatbed truck and into the hole.

Standards set by the federal Occupational Safety & Health Administration require that when someone falls in a trench that the walls of the trench need to be shored up before anyone else goes into the trench for a rescue, said Deputy Chief Robert Bosworth of the Chapel Hill Fire Department.

Rescuers and victims have been killed and injured when dirt walls have collapsed on top of them, which is why OSHA requires the bracing, Bosworth said.

The Durham Fire Department has the expertise and the equipment for trench rescues, so rescuers had to wait until the equipment came from Durham. Once the equipment arrived, thick plywood boards were placed against the dirt walls of the hole and hydraulic pistons held the boards on opposite walls in place, Bosworth said.

When it was safe, the rescue was fairly routine, Bosworth added. The rescuers entered the hole, put a neck brace on the victim, placed him on a backboard and then into a Stokes basket. Other firefighters and rescue personnel then pulled the basket out of the hole using a winch on a fire truck ladder.

The man was transported to UNC Hospitals for treatment. Officials at the scene would not comment on his condition, but he appeared to wave his hand slightly in response to a question as he was being wheeled to the ambulance.