Engineer: Crane in NYC collapse wasn’t anchored as usual, but design was ’sound and safe’

Engineer: Crane in NYC collapse had unusual base

NEW YORK — A construction crane that collapsed and killed seven people didn’t have a customary anchor to the ground, the engineer who designed it told a court Friday.

But “the design was sound and safe,” Peter Stroh testified at crane rigger William Rapetti’s manslaughter trial.

Rapetti wasn’t involved in designing the crane’s base. But his lawyer has made it a focal point in the trial, suggesting the design set up the towering rig for a fall.

Prosecutors say Rapetti did a poor job of securing a nearly 6-ton piece of steel on the crane, and the piece fell and destabilized the nearly 200-foot-tall rig. It toppled onto a midtown Manhattan block, killing six construction workers and a tourist, injuring two dozen others and leaving a swath of destruction.

Rapetti used four heavy-duty polyester straps — one badly worn — when the crane’s manufacturer called for eight, and he didn’t pad the straps to keep them from fraying, prosecutors say.

Defense lawyer Arthur Aidala says Rapetti followed normal industry practices with the straps, and the rigger’s actions didn’t cause the collapse.

Aidala argues that the nearly 200-foot-tall crane was compromised by other factors, including a design that tethered it to the building under construction, instead of bolting the rig into the ground.

Stroh acknowledged Friday that plan, designed to accommodate an electrical utility area underground, wasn’t his first choice. Both Rapetti and a city buildings official expressed concerns about whether the crane could slide off its base, but Stroh said he believed it was sound and still does.

While he testified as a witness for prosecutors, Stroh said he’d told them he thought it wrong that Rapetti was being blamed and branded reckless.

“The general consensus is that Mr. Rapetti is one of the safest riggers working,” Stroh said Friday.