By Patrick Hedlund
DNAinfo Reporter/Producer
CHINATOWN— Crew members from the fourth installment of the blockbuster "Spider-Man" series could have used the help of their friendly neighborhood web-slinger when their crane froze midair during prep for a film shoot Monday morning.
"Where's Spidey when you need him?" said film grip A.J. Brady, who watched the two-hour ordeal unfold on Market Street between Madison and Henry streets, where filming for the movie is set to take place this week.
Three men were ascending in a cherry-picker to place plywood on the roof of a building in preparation for a shoot when the power failed on the crane, they explained.
The men were about six stories high when the crane suddenly stopped working.
Fire officials got the call around 11:13 a.m. and shut down traffic on the block while using a crane of their own to send rescuers up to the lift and escort the men down.
The men were brought down safely just before noon Monday, fire officials said.
"I've been up there so many times, I try not to panic in a pressure situation," said grip Gerald Gloster, 51, who was one of the three men trapped in air for more than two hours. "You can't think if you panic."
Gloster, a union member with Local 52 Motion Picture Studio Mechanics Union, said the lift was working fine when the electrical panel suddenly went blank, leaving them marooned in midair.
"Just another day at the office," he joked.
Gloster even recorded a short film of himself and fellow workers on the crane looking down at the street below.
"Check out the SWAT team here — they had to bring another truck to get us out of here," Gloster narrates. "Look at the guys, we're stuck. Say hi, guys."
Rich Yacuk, 47, was also stuck in the lift and said that type of incident "never really happens."
"I've been up in these things so many times that I never really get nervous," he added.
"It's never happened to me — that I couldn't get down."
"The Amazing Spider-Man" is directed by Marc Webb and stars Andrew Garfield as Spidey, Dennis Leary, Martin Sheen and Emma Stone
It is set for release in July 2012.
