I Survived the Bellevue, WA Crane Crash

It’s always a wake up call when you are part of a major disaster and wonder to yourself, how did I end up in this crazy chaos? This is pretty much the feeling I experienced while having a farewell dinner with a favorite vendor of mine and on that evening in November. We had invited my husband to meet us at The Melting Pot, a great fondue restaurant in Bellevue, WA. As we were finishing up our cheese appetizer, alarms in the restaurant started sounding and a waiter dropped a tray of water glasses everywhere. At the time all I could think about is the fact I wasn’t going to be able to enjoy the gorgeous chocolate dessert that I’d been looking forward to and figured it was some yahoo that had triggered the alarm accidentally. When the manager asked us to gather our belongings and exit the restaurant throwing free coupons at us, I realized this wasn’t an accident.

Outside of the restaurant I almost passed out when I saw what lie in the road before us. A huge construction crane 200 feet tall and collapsed and the end of it had fallen on top of the building where our restaurant was located into a man’s apartment. There was patio furniture and glass all over the street as this commercial building housed residential apartments on the top of it. Though I could not see the crane operator I was sure he must’ve died (later to find out he rode that girl down and survived without any major injuries). The majority of the damage was on a commercial building across the street which housed some luxury apartments on top. It was around 7:00pm when the event took place and being first on the scene was pretty surreal. When the emergency team arrived I felt like I was five years old and couldn’t stop staring at the disarray. The officers asked us to leave and my vendor took a picture on his camera phone which didn’t turn out very well since it was dark but I’m sure you’ve seen plenty on the web. We decided to go over a few blocks to a different restaurant and finish our meal but once we arrived there everything started to sink in. I kept thinking “we could’ve died!” “We could’ve been trapped or injured.” The thoughts kept wielding and once we arrived home that night I went in my son’s room and laid next to him and just sobbed. When I found out the next day that a man who worked at the same company as I did had died and had just moved out here it really hit home.

My son’s friend’s mother was a news reporter and asked me to call in and do an interview. I tried to keep it light and more humorous at the time. Looking back it was rather silly and I sounded like an air head. I’m the type of person that reacts really well during a crisis and then falls to pieces hours or even days later. I’m so thankful that no one else perished in that incident and kept thinking if it had been 1-2 hours sooner how many people could have lost their lives. I’m glad that I have the opportunity to be here today to write about the incident and I hope that it’s the last disaster I’m involved in for quite some time!