Wednesday, November 12, 2014

"Window Washers Safe After Rescue at World Trade Center"


Firefighters Successfully Rescue Window Washers from World Trade Center!  
 
NBC News: Two window-washers were trapped for an hour on Wednesday on a scaffold dangling high off the face of 1 World Trade Center, the tallest building in the Western hemisphere.

In a statement, Upgrade Services, the company the window-washers work for, said "the cause of the incident appears to be equipment failure of the traction hoist brake mechanism that supports one side of the rig."

"This caused the scaffold to drift into an almost vertical position, leaving our men stranded until a rescue could be performed," the company said. 

The first office tenants moved into the tower last week, more than 13 years after the original World Trade Center was destroyed. The new tower stands 1,776 feet and 104 stories, and cost almost $4 billion to build.

10 comments:

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

I would not be surprised if it turned out these guys are big Bob Ross fans.

edutcher said...

You see stuff like this in the movies, but this is Sullenberger-worthy.

Rabel said...

If Haz won't link it, I will.

Trooper York said...

Hah!

bagoh20 said...

"I'm a working man in my prime."

Chip Ahoy said...

Denver 2007 similar incident, not as high up but much more violent.

ampersand said...

How is it in this day and age there isn't an automated way to do this?
Is it the powerful window washer union?

rhhardin said...

Cousin in scariest voice long ago:

I am the viper! Vere are the vindows?

Eric the Fruit Bat said...

It's a nifty enough song, and perhaps Mr. Morrison spent some time actually working as a window washer, but it's also readily apparent that he chose not to do that forever.

What remains is art, for what it's worth.

Eric the Fruit Bat said...

I think it's generally agreed that Van Morrison deserves high praise (and money) for taking a bunch of pop music forms or traditions and melding them into something that bears his distinctive signature. Good for him. The word might be "eclectic" but perhaps that has become somewhat pejorative.

"Cleaning Windows" reminds me of that song about the guy who is just an regular working man, as anyone here can see, but when I get a couple of drinks on a Saturday, Glasgow belongs to me.

Well, only a little. There are only so many ideas out there to go around. If you want to succeed in the entertainment business, you have to get over that fifth grade thing about not imitating someone else. When I was in college, I was friends with a guy who was in a band who would, LITERALLY, write original songs by taking some obscure song he liked and LITERALLY re-write it. If you didn't know the original song you'd be none the wiser.

And no, that college friend was not Bruce Springsteen re-writing "Domino" and turning it into "The E Street Shuffle."