Battersea Crane Disaster Action Group

On Tuesday 26th September 2006, two young men tragically lost their lives due to a crane collapse at a Barratts site on Thessaly Road in Battersea. One young man was a crane driver, the other was Michael Alexa, the son of a local resident. Michael was innocently taking care of his car when the crane crashed down on top of him, after the crane driver had landed in the windscreen of a nearby car. For "safety" reasons, Michael Alexa was left at the site for five days before his body was removed. A nearby low rise block of flats was also badly damaged, resulting in the whole block being evacuated for at least a week. One end of the damaged block comprised of shops on the ground floor with flats directly above. The shops served the local community, which has a number of elderly members, a lot of whom relied heavily on these shops. They have been closed ever since the disaster and the future of these shops is still not known.The site previously housed John Milton Primary School, which was closed in August 2004, much to the anger of us parents and local residents. Protests were made and it was put to the Council that the main reason they wanted to close the school was because of the intended developement of Battersea Power Station, just across the road. We felt that the council were just looking to make a profit from selling the land, which would have been worthless without the plans for Battersea Power Station.Since the crane disaster, no one has accepted any responsibility for the deaths of the two men. Not Barratts, whose building site it was and not Falcon Cranes, who were the suppliers of the cranes. In fact, although they were invited to a public meeting, on 25 October 2006, Falcon Crane Hire did not send anyone along to represent them. Wandsworth Council were also invited to attend as it was felt that, since selling the land, and granting planning permission to Barratts, they have effectively washed their hands of the whole thing. Quite astonishing, we think, seeing as Barratts are building practically on top of an existing council housing estate, run by Wandsworth Council themselves.We are also quite astonished to learn that it is not law for crane inspections to be carried out by independent bodies and that the developers are actually allowed to use someone from within the company. Surely that's like me M.O.T'ing my own car!!!This kind of incident is becoming increasingly common. We want to stamp it out so that more innocent people do not have to lose their lives for the sake of large companies making money.For details of weekly BCDAG meetings keep checking into this Myspace pageWE NEED YOUR SUPPORT!!!