Four Killed, 4 Others Injured After Crane Smashes Cars at Google Campus

Four people were killed and four others were injured when a crane collapsed Saturday afternoon in the northwestern US city of Seattle, the fire department said.

The Seattle Times reported the crane was used as part of construction work to build a new Google campus in the city, a fast-growing tech hub famously home to e-commerce giant Amazon.

In a statement, the fire department said the crane "fell from the roof of a building" and hit six vehicles below, near the southern shore of Lake Union, which lies in the centre of the city.

It said three men and one woman were killed — two of whom were operators in the crane, while the others were in different cars.

Of the four people injured, a 27-year-old man, a 25-year-old woman and a four-month-old baby girl were taken to hospital with non-life threatening injuries, the department said.

"A full and thorough investigation into the cause of the crane failure is being conducted by Washington State Department of Labor and Industries," the fire department said.