NYC Construction Year Off to Bad Start

From 2010 to 2011, construction-related injuries decreased by 7.8 percent in the city, according to an announcement made by Mayor Michael Bloomberg in January. Following a decrease in 2011, the figures have jumped back up in 2012. Year to date statistics show that the number of injuries in 2012 has nearly doubled 2011 figures. (Chart by Diana Hubert-Benedetti/The Epoch Times)

NEW YORK—During a demolition project in Upper Manhattan on March 22, an uncontrolled steel framing collapse, killed one worker, and injured two others.

On April 3, a building expansion project in Gerritsen Beach, Brooklyn, collapsed without proper support to hold up the addition. One worker was killed and two injured.

These are the only two deaths on Department of Buildings projects this year, and both were caused by material failure. Incidence of material failure has risen around 50 percent from this time last year.

“Material failures are your worst accidents,” said Assistant Department of Buildings (DOB) Commissioner Michael Alacha, who presented DOB statistics at the Build Safe/Live Safe Conference held by the DOB on Monday, “because they’re not one-to-one injuries. Most material failure—collapses—will have multiple injuries.”