HOUSTON -- Three contract workers had to be rescued after a cable broke Tuesday, leaving their scaffolding dangling 10 stories high in the Greenway Plaza area.
The accident was apparently caused by wind gusts up to 50 mph that caught the workers off-guard.
"The wind started up a lot more fierce than they expected," said Houston District Fire Chief Robert Schlieter. "It started to move the scaffolding around to the point where it was starting to swing free."
The scaffolding swayed back and forth, crashing into the glass building and breaking several windows at 11 Greenway Plaza.
"They broke a window trying to escape at first, but it went into a walled room where they weren't able to escape," said Schlieter.
The crew held on for dear life and desperately tried to grab a rope to pull themselves back toward the building.
Jose Lopez Jr. watched the drama unfold from a nearby building. He caught it on home video.
"It was kind of terrifying actually," Lopez said. "I heard the people behind me praying for them and just watching it, you got to think about what could happen and hoping that the lines wouldn't break."
Finally, more than half an hour after the scaffolding broke, the workers were able to pull it back flush with the building.
"One of them had a suction cup and he was trying to grab the window and the suction cup to bring it in," Lopez said. "And it took awhile, but he finally did it. They seemed pretty calm and cool."
Then they used a glass cutter to create an opening in the building. All three crawled through the opening into the building.
The Houston Fire Department sent ambulances to the scene, but none of the workers was injured.
The workers had been hired to replace the weather-proofing seals on the high-rise's windows.
They were in harnesses and were never in any real danger, according to an HFD spokesman at the scene.
