Gainesville Fire Rescue pulled a construction worker out of a collapsed trench Monday afternoon after a 14-foot wall of clay and sand trapped him.
Workers were on site by a stormwater vault at 800 SE Fourth St. when the wall of the trench collapsed and pinned a worker to the vault, said Gainesville Fire Rescue Lt. Don Campbell.
Fellow construction workers used their hands and shovels to free the man from the dirt, which weighs about 100 pounds per cubic foot, Campbell said.
Firefighters and members of GFR’s technical rescue team arrived at about 4 p.m. to find the worker mostly freed from the sand and clay. They latched a backboard to a ladder to remove him from the hole.
“That was really the only way we could get him out without causing the trench to collapse any farther,” Campbell said.
Firefighters pulled the worker from the hole within minutes, and he was rushed to UF Health Shands Hospital under a trauma alert.
The instability of the ground caused a tricky situation for rescuers, said Deputy Chief Jeff Lane. An overhang of dirt and debris could have collapsed at any moment.
“(Members of the technical team) had to accept higher risks than they are normally comfortable with,” he said.
A version of this story ran on page 8 on 1/15/2014 under the headline "Firefighters rescue construction worker"
