If you were hurt in a scaffolding accident on a construction site, a NYC scaffolding accident lawyer can help you hold the responsible parties accountable and recover for what the accident cost you. Scaffolds put workers at height on a structure that somebody else built, inspected, and signed off on, and when a plank, a guardrail, a tie-in, or a suspension rope fails, the fall is measured in stories rather than feet.
New York gives scaffold workers the strongest protection in the country, and it applies whether the scaffold collapsed under you, dropped material on you, or was never equipped the way it should have been. Korman Lynch Lustig & Sassower handles scaffolding accident cases and moves quickly to protect them, because a scaffold comes down and goes back on a truck within days. Below are straight answers to the questions injured workers ask our scaffolding accident attorneys most.
Call us at (212) 732-4992 24/7 to arrange to speak with a personal injury lawyer about your case, or contact us through our website today.
You likely have a case if you were hurt on or near a scaffold because of a structural failure, a bad setup, or missing protective equipment. Like other construction accident claims, you usually do not have to prove your employer was negligent, because New York places strict duties on owners and contractors for elevation work. You also do not have to know which component gave way. Our scaffolding accident lawyers review what happened at no cost.
The Scaffold Law requires owners and general contractors to furnish and maintain scaffolds, hoists, ropes, and similar devices so workers are properly protected from elevation hazards. Two things about it matter more than anything else in a scaffold case.
First, the responsibility is not something an owner or a general contractor can hand off by contract. They answer for the scaffold even if they never touched it and even if the erection subcontractor was the one who built it wrong.
Second, when the law applies, your own carelessness generally does not reduce what you recover. That is the opposite of how nearly every other injury case works, and it is why insurers spend so much energy arguing that a scaffold case is really something else. A scaffold that collapsed, tipped, shifted, dropped a plank, or was missing rails is the clearest example of the protection the statute was written for.
The type of scaffold decides who built it, which rules applied, and where the proof lives.
Frame, tube and coupler, and system scaffolds standing on the ground or on a structure. They fail from missing base plates and mudsills, footing on soft or uneven ground, missing tie-ins to the building, incomplete planking, missing guardrails, overloading with material, and being climbed on the cross braces because no safe access was provided.
Platforms hung from a roof by outriggers, parapet clamps, or counterweights, raised and lowered on hoists and ropes. These produce the worst outcomes in the city, and the failure points are specific: counterweights short or improvised, outriggers not tied back, ropes and hoists not inspected, no independent lifeline and harness for each worker, wind, and rigging assembled by people who were not qualified to do it.
The sheds and pipe scaffolds standing over New York City sidewalks for years at a time. They injure workers erecting and dismantling them, and they injure pedestrians when planks, pipe, or debris come off, which makes those falling object and premises liability claims.
The interior scaffolds used for ceiling and wall work. They tip when casters are not locked, when a worker rides one being moved, when they are set up on a slope or debris, and when guardrails are left off because the height looks manageable. A fall from a baker's scaffold onto concrete still fractures skulls and spines.
Single point suspended seats used for facade and window work, where the entire load rides on one rope and one anchor, and where the fall protection has to be independent of the support line.
Scaffold safety is a set of concrete requirements, and a case is usually built by naming which one was missing:
The cases our scaffolding accident attorneys handle most involve scaffold collapses from overloading, defective assembly, or component failure, missing guardrails, harnesses, and tie-off points, unsafe erection and dismantling, gaps and unsecured planking, worn or broken parts kept in service, tools and material dropped from a platform onto workers below, wet, icy, or debris covered planks, and scaffolds struck by a delivery, a lift, or a crane load swinging past.
Erection and dismantling deserve their own mention. That is when the guardrails are not up yet or have already come off, when planks are being passed by hand, and when workers are moving on a structure that is only partly complete. A disproportionate number of serious scaffold injuries happen in those hours, and the phase is supposed to be supervised for exactly that reason.
Often several parties are, and rarely just your employer. The property owner, the general contractor, and the construction manager carry the elevation duties. The scaffold company that erected, rented, or inspected the structure, the rigging contractor on a suspended scaffold, the engineer who designed or signed off on it, the subcontractor that overloaded or altered it, and the manufacturer of a failed component can all be defendants. Where the building or project belongs to the City, the MTA, a school authority, or the Housing Authority, the public agency belongs in the case as well, on a much shorter deadline.
Each of these parties brings its own insurance. On a scaffold case with catastrophic injuries, finding all of it is what makes a lifetime of care something other than a hope.
Often, yes. Workers' compensation pays part of your medical bills and lost wages no matter who was at fault, but it does not cover pain and suffering and it usually blocks a claim against your employer. Because the Scaffold Law reaches owners and contractors directly, there is frequently a separate case worth many times the compensation claim.
At the end of that case the compensation carrier is repaid part of what it spent, and that repayment can be negotiated down so more of the recovery stays with you. Our scaffolding accident lawyers pursue both and handle the lien as part of the work.
You have a claim, and workers' compensation does not limit it in any way. Pedestrians are injured when planks, pipe, brackets, or debris fall from a scaffold, when a shed is struck or collapses, when the walkway under a shed is unlit, flooded, or obstructed, and when a shed is left standing and unmaintained for years. Those cases run against the building owner, the managing agent, the scaffold company, and the contractor doing the work.
The scaffold itself is the case, and it is usually gone within days. Our scaffolding accident lawyers move immediately for preservation of the structure and its components, the failed plank, clamp, bracket, rope, or hoist, and then for the paper record: erection drawings and engineering sign-offs, permits and inspection filings, scaffold tags and daily inspection logs, rental agreements, hoist and rigging inspection and maintenance records, counterweight calculations on a suspended scaffold, daily logs and toolbox talks, delivery tickets, harness and lifeline issuance records, weather data where wind is involved, and site and neighboring building video.
Buildings Department violations, stop work orders, and complaints about that scaffold, along with OSHA inspection files, show what was known before anyone fell. Coworkers who erected or used the scaffold in the days before are often the most valuable witnesses, and they are the hardest to find later.
The defenses are familiar, and each has an answer:
Get medical care first, then protect the case before the scaffold comes down.
Falls from a scaffold cause severe harm, and so does being struck by one or by what comes off it:
Low height falls belong on that list too. What the body lands on matters as much as how far it fell.
Yes. Immigration status does not stop you from bringing a scaffolding accident claim in New York or from recovering, and it does not matter whether you were paid off the books. The elevation safety laws protect every worker on the site, and our scaffolding accident lawyers protect that right without involving anyone else in your status.
In most cases you have three years from the date of the accident to file a lawsuit, and two years in a death case. If a public entity is involved, a written notice of claim is usually due within ninety days. Filing for workers' compensation does not preserve the case against the owner, the contractor, or the scaffold company. Because the scaffold is dismantled and trucked away within days, the real clock on the evidence runs far sooner than the legal deadline.
No lawyer can promise a number, but a claim can pursue:
Because responsibility is often settled early under the Scaffold Law, these cases tend to turn on the value of the injury rather than on who was at fault, which is why the medical proof and the future care plan matter so much.
Nothing upfront. Our scaffolding accident lawyers handle these cases on a contingency fee basis, which means you pay no attorney's fee unless there is a recovery for you. The first consultation is free and carries no obligation.
Korman Lynch Lustig & Sassower carries the case so you can focus on your recovery. Our scaffolding accident lawyers:
Our scaffolding accident lawyers prepare every case as if it will be tried, because that is what makes an owner, a contractor, and their insurers take the claim seriously. A settlement on the right number is welcome. A settlement that shortchanges what the accident cost you is not one this firm accepts just because it comes early.
A scaffold is dismantled and returned within days, and the evidence that proves your case goes with it. The sooner your case is built, the stronger it is. Contact Korman Lynch Lustig & Sassower for a free consultation about your NYC scaffolding accident.
Call us at (212) 732-4992 24/7 to arrange to speak with a personal injury lawyer about your case, or contact us through our website today.
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