The company building the Eglinton Crosstown LRT is facing renewed scrutiny after a crane collapsed at one of its work sites Monday evening, the third accident to beset the transit project in a little over a month.

Crosslinx, the consortium building the $5.3 billion light rail line,said the mobile crane at its Mount Pleasant Station site toppled over at around 6 p.m. when a sinkhole opened up beneath it.

The boom of the crane crashed into the construction site and extended onto a nearby sidewalk, according to Crosslinx spokesperson Kristin Jenkins. The operator escaped the cab unhurt, but one worker slipped and bruised his knee as he fled the collapse. He was taken to hospital and released.

Jenkins said the company believes the sinkhole was caused by water “coming from a sanitary line that was located under where we had the crane placed,” but it won’t know for certain until the ministry of labour clears workers to go back to the site.

The crane incident occurred five weeks after a hillside collapsed at a separate LRT work site near Brentcliffe Road on Oct. 20. No one was hurt, but residents in nearby homes were ordered to not enter their backyards until Crosslinx could ensure the area was stabilized.

One day before that, a worker suffered serious back injuries when he fell into a hole at a Crosstown construction site at Bathurst Street.

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