Worker transported to hospital in stable condition
Crane operators on Parliament Hill’s Centre Block project played a central role in rescuing an injured construction worker from a hard-to-reach area of the site on Friday, according to Ottawa emergency officials.
Ottawa Paramedic Service spokesperson Marc-Antoine Deschamps said the worker suffered blunt force trauma at about 8 a.m. in an area of the Centre Block rehabilitation project that was not accessible by stretcher. The multi-year project involves extensive restoration work on Parliament’s main building.
Because of the location, paramedics and firefighters were forced to reach the worker on foot. Deschamps told local media the worker was in a section of the worksite that was “difficult to access with a stretcher,” prompting first responders to rely on cranes already operating on the site to complete the evacuation.
Cranes were first used to move medical and rescue equipment into the accident zone. According to Deschamps, cranes lifted a stretcher and other gear to the accident site, then took the victim and first responders back to safety, as reported by the Ottawa Citizen.
After assessing the worker, paramedics determined the injury was serious but not life-threatening. To extract the patient, crews loaded the worker, a paramedic and a firefighter from the rope rescue team into a large metal box that was attached to a crane and hoisted out of the confined area to a waiting ambulance.
“The operators were amazing,” Deschamps said, describing the effort as a “complicated” recovery in a challenging environment. He added that “the (crane) operators knew what they were doing… Kudos to them,” accoridng to the Ottawa Citizen report.
Paramedics said the worker was transported to hospital in stable condition and the injuries were not considered life-threatening. No further details about the cause of the blunt-force injury were released.
Cranes have been a central safety issue in British Columbia. Now, B.C. is moving to introduce mandatory licensing and permitting for crane work under WorkSafeBC, in what observers say is the most significant expansion of crane safety oversight since a series of high‑profile incidents and regulatory reforms began in 2021.
