Photo: Melissa Hom
So here’s a question: If the folks working on Trump Soho were slapped with a stop-work order after yesterday’s horrific accident, why the hell is the crane still moving? It was slowly rotating back and forth this morning, and we just spent the last ten minutes at our office window watching the machine clearly rotate and even rise a bit. It doesn’t make us feel any better to think that perhaps it’s just the wind causing the movement, because that would suggest one massively unstable crane. A call to the Department of Buildings informs us that the only work that can continue is “remedial work” to make the site safe, but DOB is unclear as to whether the crane is part of that. They’re looking into it; we’ll just be here in the meantime, nervously staring at the thing.
Oh, look: It quite literally stopped while we were writing this item. The power of a phone call?
Update 6:50 PM: The DOB clarifies with a late-breaking statement: “The Stop Work Order does not apply to remedial work required to make the site safe, such as securing loose materials on the upper floors of the building. The crane is being used to conduct the remedial work.” So there you go. Not that it makes the scene any more comfortable to watch.
Earlier: Building Collapse at Trump Soho
