UPDATE: One Person Injured After Downtown Duluth Sidewalk Collapses Under Window Washing Lift Vehicle

UPDATE: 5:15 PM 11/1/23: 

The Duluth Fire Department provided an update on a situation from earlier Wednesday along West 1st Street in Duluth.

The department explained that they were dispatched to the scene shortly before noon on Wednesday after the sidewalk collapsed under two of the wheels of a lift vehicle being used for window washing.

The bucket at the end of the boom landed against the building, pinning the maintenance worker to the exterior of the building under the weight of the boom.

The individual was removed within about 10 minutes of the department arriving on the scene, and transported via Mayo Ambulance to a local hospital for non-life-threatening injuries.

Crews remained on the scene into the afternoon to remove the tipped lift from the hole in the sidewalk, leading to the road being closed through much of the afternoon. Another piece of lift equipment was brought onto the scene to get the lift out of the sidewalk, eventually allowing for the street to be reopened.

ORIGINAL STORY: 1:00 PM 11/1/23:

A block of West 1st Street in Downtown Duluth is temporarily closed Wednesday afternoon as crews work to upright a window washer lift that appears to have partially broken through the sidewalk or collapsed in the area in which it was working.

As of 12:45 pm on Wednesday, the Duluth Fire Department had the block of West 1st Street between 3rd and 4th Avenue West blocked off and a crane had been brought in to upright and remove a fully-extended lift that appears to have broken through a portion of the sidewalk.

The extended lift is currently leaning up against the second level of the Roscoe's Pioneer Bar building, appearing to have caused some damage to the fire escape on the building, but other damage to the building appears to be limited.

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Some bricks on the sidewalk under where the lift's tires on the building side of the sidewalk would appear to be displaced, and the tires on that side of the lift are not visible. No other information about the cause of this was available at the time of this news.

We will update this post as more information becomes available. In the meantime, you should avoid the area, as it is blocked off to both vehicle and pedestrian traffic.