Memorial outside the construction site where five men were killed by a falling tower crane, one year after the 2021 tragedy.

(ROB MUNRO / iNFOnews.ca)

As far as Chris Vilnes is concerned, new rules are needed now not later to make workers safer on tower cranes, like the one that collapsed in the summer of 2021 in downtown Kelowna, killing his son Cailen and four others.

The fact that there were two scary incidents with tower cranes in the Lower Mainland in January just reinforces his belief.

“I know WorkSafe is probably waiting until the investigation is done,” Vilness told iNFOnews.ca in response to reports that the RCMP is seeking criminal negligence charges in the case.

“Until (WorkSafeBC) knows what the findings are, they’re not going to make any changes. That’s too damn late. They know what the problems are. They need to address the problems and not wait for the investigation. WorkSafe needs to take a bigger role in this and step up and make changes in the industry now. I don’t think waiting is really an option.”

The July 2021 crane collapse happened as his son and four other workers were attempting to take it down. One of those workers survived but Brad Zawislak was killed while working in a neighbouring building when the crane fell on it.

Vilnes was told by police about three weeks ago that they were going to recommend that criminal negligence charges causing death be laid.

READ MORE: UPDATE: Criminal negligence charges being considered in fatal Kelowna crane collapse

Since the RCMP had worked with Crown counsel during the 2.5-year investigation, it’s likely a foregone conclusion that charges will be laid, Vilnes said, although he’s been told that it will likely take about three months to make that decision.

That’s too long to wait for regulatory changes that allowed his inexperienced son to help take the crane down next to the Brooklyn residential tower in downtown Kelowna on that fateful day.

“Most tower cranes that go up, from what I understand, their supervisor has about 10 years, minimum, of experience,” Vilnes said. “These individuals probably had 10 years between all of them. There should have been another leader present that had enough experience to direct the less experienced individuals. But it didn’t happen.”

The crane operator – in this case Patrick Stremmer, son of the crane company’s owner – had to be licenced but the four men working on the tower only needed to be deemed competent. As far as Vilnes knows, there's no standard for judging that competency so anyone can be chosen to do that work.

Vilnes’ son Cailen had some training to help put the crane up but had worked on it for, maybe, a total of 1.5 years on and off. He worked on another job for two months before the collapse and had just returned to work on the tower the day it fell.

“Would I say Cailen had enough experience to make the right decisions?” Viness asked. “No. He definitely didn’t and, I think, that would go for the majority of the crew, unfortunately.”

Four men worked at the top of the tower with the task of removing pins holding sections together so they could be pulled out of the tower and lowered to the ground.

“He was on the top part of each section, standing across from Jared (Zook),” Vilnes said. “Eric (Stremmer) and Levi Vilnes – Levi is the survivor – were on the bottom part of the climber. I believe this was the second section to come out. There was some friction. It was not coming out easily. They were having a hard time getting the pins out.

“That means there was stress on the tower which means they should have aborted and tried to see what the issue was. That didn’t happen so they continued to move forward and once they popped the pin on the second section – boom – it went over backwards. The paint was starting to flake off the steel, which means it was under extreme stress. There’s no turning back from that. Once it gets to that stage, they were done for. They didn’t know how to correct it.”

More experienced workers would likely have stopped work and determined what corrective actions needed to be taken long before the flaking paint indicated catastrophic stress, Vilnes said.

READ MORE: Kelowna tower crane collapse one of the deadliest in recent memory

On Jan. 25, a busy section of the Lougheed Highway in Burnaby was closed when a section of a tower crane at a construction site was dangling over the building.

On Jan. 30, a similar incident happened on a Surrey highrise site.

“When the tower crane collapsed in Kelowna on July 12, 2021, killing five workers, that should have been the trigger for BC to be the leader in tower crane safety across Canada,” Josh Towsley, International Union of Operation Engineers Local 115, said in a Jan. 31 news release. “Two incidents in four days is a clear demonstration that we need stronger regulations in our industry.”

Those regulations should include making tower crane construction and rigging a compulsory trade requiring certification, the union said.

That’s why, as far as Vilnes is concerned, there’s lots of blame to go around and no need to wait to make changes.

“Do we blame Stemmer?” he asked. “He made a bad judgement call but did he actually break any rules? I don’t know if he did. So who’s to blame here? It’s easy to blame the contractor. He made the mistake of putting those guys on the tower that day but, personally, I believe he is not the one that should take the majority of the blame for what happened.

“The industry allowed this to happen, I feel, from what I know and understand. So, it’s bigger than just going at the contractor. He’s just the easy target, unfortunately. You know he would never sacrifice his only sons.

“Was the general contractor in this case a crane expert? Probably not. But, as general contractor, somebody on their team that’s allowing work like this to happen – there needs to be a level of experience on that team to understand what your contractors are doing on your worksite. It wasn’t Stemmer Construction worksite. It was a Mission Group worksite so you have a massive responsibility of protecting people on that job site, based on a standard, based on the culture.”

Vilnes knows what he’s talking about. He’s worked in the construction industry all his 32 years of adult life and is now a construction manager.

Cailen’s mother Danielle Pritchett spoke of her concerns about the safety of that worksite at a memorial after the tragedy. She had worked as a safety inspector on construction sites and talked about Cailen being ostracized on worksites for speaking out about safety concerns. She did not say if he raised concerns about the worksite where the crane collapsed.

READ MORE: Mother tormented as she waited for news of her son after fatal Kelowna crane collapse

One of Vilnes' two remaining sons is a certified ironworker and the other is an apprentice pipe fitter and plumber. Cailen was planning to start an apprentice carpentry program at Okanagan College in October 2021, so the entire family has been involved in construction safety for many years.

“I’m also the person that, basically, has got people's lives at my fingertips so it’s my responsibility to make sure I have plans for people that are working under me and make sure that they go home to their families every day,” Vilnes said. “It’s not my place to take their lives for granted. I don’t feel anybody has that right and, I think in this case, that was the case. I think not knowing, obviously, what was about to happen, but in hindsight, people’s lives were not considered.”

That doesn’t mean he can plan for every eventuality on the worksite.

“I don’t have all the answers either so you rely on a regulated industry through laws put in place by WorkSafe or other government bodies,” Vilnes said. “It’s also surrounding yourself with the right people to help you fully understand what the risks are on any project.”

He pointed out that these workers are mostly young men with families – something Cailen never had time to start.

“If Cailen didn’t go to work that day, it could have been someone else sitting in my spot missing their son and wishing everything was different,” Vilnes said. “It could be anyone. They’re all the kids next door.”

According to WorkSafeBC, there are about 350 tower cranes working in BC.

“I think there were people that could have said this isn’t happening, you don’t have the experience,” Vilnes said. “I think there are groups, like WorkSafe, that have to have stricter rules and regulations to make sure any contractor doesn’t have the freedom to put people’s lives in jeopardy.”

He wishes the investigation had been done faster but hopes the delay just means it was thorough.

“There is no way that I will ever move on from this but I absolutely have to move forward,” Vilnes said. “Moving forward is what Cailen would expect of me and his mother and his stepmom and his family. We’re all doing our best at moving forward.”

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