Front End Loader Operator Plunges to Death in Chicago

The operator of a front-end loader was killed when the machine he was on fell seven stories to the ground in Chicago.

Chicago Fire Department spokesman Quention Curtis says the Bobcat was lifted early Tuesday to the seventh floor of a Harold Ickes Public Housing building that is being demolished. Once the operator started up the machine, he lost control and it fell to the ground.

Curtis says the driver, a man in his 30s who wasn’t identified, was extricated by Fire Department personnel and taken to Northwestern Memorial Hospital, where he later died.

Chicago police spokeswoman Officer JoAnn Taylor says the department was conducting a death investigation of the accident.

Investigators from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration were also looking into the mishap.

Information from: Chicago Tribune, www.chicagotribune.com