Crashed crane came from Germany, and not China

JEDDAH: The ill-fated crane that crashed in the Grand Mosque in Makkah on Friday claiming 111 lives was made in Ehingen, Germany.

This demolishes rumors on social media in the immediate aftermath of the tragedy that it was made in China.
Responding to questions from Arab News on Monday, Kristian Kueppers, corporate communications chief at the Liebherr Group, said his company was extremely saddened by the tragic accident and the fatalities and injuries, and sent its deepest sympathy to the families of the victims.
He said there are approximately 30 cranes of this type in operation worldwide. “The most powerful crawler crane in the world of conventional design is our LR 13000,” he said.
“There can be different reasons for the collapse of a crane," he said. “To provide a conclusive statement on the part of Liebherr is impossible at the moment. We do not want to indulge in any guessing. We want to wait for the results of the official investigations.”
On whether such cranes are geared to stand in fierce weather, Kueppers said: “There are clear instructions in the manual on how to secure a crane under different weather conditions.”
On the duration required to assemble such a crane at a project site, he said: “It depends on the configuration and the expertise of the team.”
There have been umpteen photographs in the media showing the Liebherr crane with its base tipped forward and its superstructure leaning into the mosque where it struck.
On Monday, a team of engineers from Saudi Binladin Group was cutting through the machine to disassemble it. Engineers said it would take six days to remove it.
Cranes are mostly yellow and the general assumption was that the red-colored ones are from China and yellow from Germany.
However, Kueppers clarified that “there was no special significance to any particular color.”