January 15, 2011
Minnesota

Wind turbine rolls over two men

By: Gordon Severson , ABC 6 News, kaaltv.com 14 January 2011

Two men are recovering Friday after a piece of a wind turbine rolls over two workers in Rochester Township.

It happened Friday morning around 8:30 and sent both men to the hospital.

The company was finishing up the turbine installation on a private residence off of County Road 104, when a piece of the turbine fell on both workers.

Wind turbine company Renewable Energy S.D. is no stranger to the business of installing wind power equipment.

“This crew that did it, had not had an incident in 26 years. It just, just something happened,” Property and Wind Turbine owner Don Burns said.

When Burns came home this morning, he expected to see a finished wind turbine, but instead saw police cars and a medical helicopter.

“When I came home it was ambulances were here, and Mayo 1 was here addressing the situation. after they got the guys stabilized they took them to mayo,” he said.

Early this morning we received information that the wind turbine itself actually collapsed and fell on these workers, but what really happened was a sixty to seventy foot chunk of it was resting on the ground and it merely rolled over on the men.

“Tower rolled over and pinned two people to the ground. Like I say, they’ve done this before and this is the sixth tower they put up. Had no incidents, again, something unexplainable happened and causes a job site incident,” Burns said.

Company officials say both men suffered cracked pelvis’s and luckily had no internal bleeding. One of the workers was released this afternoon and the other is expected to be released later Friday night or Saturday morning.

The crew that was working on Friday’s turbine was the exact same crew that finished up wind turbines in Eyota and Utica yesterday and the day before.

Representatives from the company are relieved that neither of the injured workers will require surgery or prolonged hospital stays.

URL to article:  https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2011/01/15/wind-turbine-rolls-over-two-men/