When the asphalt parking lot at Portales De Vero suddenly gave way with a loud crash beneath a 50-ton crane last month, the first thought was that a sinkhole had opened up. Now, though, it has been discovered the crane actually broke through the top of a large underground chamber built and covered over decades ago and since forgotten.
It was about a quarter after eight on the morning of Tuesday, April 25 when the massive piece of construction equipment owned by Beyel Brothers Crane and Rigging Service suddenly dropped beneath the surface of the parking lot.
Cathie Keller was preparing to greet the day’s first clients at Studio Gabriel Day Spa, and employees of other businesses in the 21,000-square-foot commercial plaza at the corner of Ocean Drive and Azalea Lane were beginning to arrive, when Keller was jolted by what she described as “a big boom.” She said pedestrians out on Ocean Drive were startled by the loud sound and reverberation.
A crowd quickly gathered in the parking lot: curious bystanders, building employees, and a representative of Portales’ property management firm, Lambert Commercial Real Estate, all pointing, shaking their heads, snapping cellphone photos and speculating about what, exactly, had occurred.
Fortunately, no cars were parked in the collapsed area and the crane operator was able to extricate himself from the partially visible machine he had driven into the lot.
Beyel Brothers, headquartered in Cocoa, dispatched another multi-ton crane to lift the first one out of the hole, and by late morning the damaged crane been dragged to the far side of the lot, a Beyel employee sitting on it, gloomily asking people to please not cross the red hazard tape encircling the site.
According to Vero Beach Public Works Director Monte Falls, the underground chamber that collapsed is not part of the city’s drainage system. Falls located several old schematic drawings and determined that the crane had fallen into a private reservoir that was part of a drainage system installed by the property owners in 1979 to collect stormwater runoff from the parking lot for irrigation purposes.
“That was a pretty innovative idea back then,” Falls said. He described the containment area as 48 feet long by 20 feet wide by 5 feet deep.
While no detailed information was immediately available as to why the heavy crane was in the parking lot, a Lambert representative said Beyel was contracted to a company working for the property management firm, and was on the property in that capacity.
As to what it will cost to repair the damage or who will pay for it, Lambert is declining to discuss any further details at this time, citing ongoing discussions with the insurance companies involved. Calls to Beyel’s safety director Glen Weatherington have not been returned.
Meanwhile, the area around the gaping, water-filled hole is cordoned off with chain link fencing and cars continue to park in other sections of the L-shaped lot, presumably in no danger of disappearing into the ground.
