MIAMI — A woman and three men were recovering on Tuesday after surviving the collapse of an 85-foot piling rig on Monday morning in Miami’s Brickell neighborhood.
Miami Fire Chief Robert Hevia said the three men were working shortly after 8 a.m. on Monday at the construction site of Citadel’s 58-story building at 1201 Brickell Bay Drive.
“It’s a remarkable day for them,” Hevia said about the four survivors injured.
A 47-year-old man was injured while working as an operator in the cabin of the piling rig, used for heavy drilling. Hevia said he managed to jump out of the cabin as the rig was tipping over.
The two other men were injured and trapped after the rig’s lower mast and drill pipe crushed a temporary container office set up at the site by Related Companies, the developer.
Hevia said fire rescue personnel cut through the steel conex box to free the two men, aged 27 and 29. One of the men hugged a firefighter before walking away.
The woman was driving a white BMW sports utility vehicle southbound on Brickell Bay Drive when she saw the rig coming down between Southeast 12th and 13th streets.
Hevia said she “was able to pull her car in reverse,” so the rig landed on the hood, the engine caught on fire, and she escaped with minor injuries through the back of the BMW.
“The flames were shooting up 30 feet in the air,” Christina Lardon, a witness, said.
Fire rescue personnel took the woman to HCA Florida Mercy Hospital and the three men to Jackson Memorial Hospital’s Ryder Trauma Center.
“It was shock and awe and fear ... I am shaken because it could have been me,” Lardon said.
The rig also damaged two cars that were parked on opposite sides of Brickell Bay Drive just outside of The Dade Heritage Trust’s historic 1905 wood-frame cottage.
“We are working in full cooperation with City and County building departments to secure the site and conduct a full investigation,” Kathleen Anne Corless, a spokeswoman for Related Companies, wrote in a statement.
A mitigation crew worked on a fuel spill. Teams with the Occupational Safety and Health Administration and Miami-Dade County Unsafe Structures responded to the construction site.
Watch aerial video of the site
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