Brewer Construction Incident

BREWER – Maine State Police, Brewer Police and Fire, along with MaineDOT responded to the scene of a construction accident that happened along I-395 in Brewer at the Wilson Street overpass bridge project.  At approximately 3:24 pm yesterday afternoon 2 construction workers were standing on a temporary wooden walkway on the overpass above the I-395 exit to Wilson Street.  They were removing cross bracing that connected the outer bridge beam to the beam beside it.  They had removed several braces when the outer bridge beam apparently twisted unexpectedly as the support was removed, this in turn caused the platform that they were standing on to shift out of the flange area and fall to the roadway below.  Both workers who were identified as a 19 Y.O. Garrett Mulligan and 56 Y.O. Darren Pelletier fell approximately 20 feet, landing on top of the walkway material.  Fortunately there were no vehicles immediately below the area as the men fell.  The pair suffered injuries and were taken by ambulance to Northern Light Eastern Maine Medical Center in Bangor.
 
This construction site is part of a Maine Department of Transportation project to replace several interstate bridges. The contractor on this project is Wyman and Simpson out of Richmond who the injured men work. Work on the project was suspended, the off ramps were closed for several hours while the debris was removed and the site was made safe for traffic to resume.
   
Federal officials from the Federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) were contacted by the State Police, they are the lead investigating agency.