Celebrity spotting! The largest crane at Rio Rancho’s Intel plant, a 450-foot giant with a load capacity of 800 tons, has its own Instagram fan page.
After the Journal ran a story breaking down some of the facts of the massive structure towering above the plant, Intel employee and crane superfan Joee Sanchez reached out to share her Instagram page and the story of its creation, made in honor of the crane.
The crane is part of a $3.5 billion expansion of Intel’s plant, which will enable the company to manufacture new types of semiconductor technology. Last summer, the Journal reported that the company expected the work to be done sometime this year.
Sanchez, a supply line manager at Intel in Rio Rancho, said the crane on the company’s construction site became a source of awe for many of her colleagues. As the metal structure was erected, the workplace obsession grew, and so did her own.
“People would go get their coffee and just stand outside and watch this thing be put up,” Sanchez said.
So, as one does when an oddity appears, Sanchez began posting pictures of the crane to her Instagram account. Soon, her friends were all sending her their own pictures of the towering structure.
Eventually, Sanchez said, someone suggested they vote on the best crane picture. Thus the Instagram account @onlycranes22 was born, with a feed full of pictures of Rio Rancho’s most famous crane from every angle. The page now has 22 followers, with 36 posts on its feed.
The crane pictures were voted on via likes on the app, with the apparent winner of the contest being a black-and-white photo of the structure with a dinosaur image pasted next to it, seemingly as a mock size comparison.
Sanchez said she has no affiliation with the construction company in charge of the cranes, and talked about it with the Journal from “an entertainment standpoint,” not on behalf of Intel.
Despite the contest being over, Sanchez said she still receives pictures of the towering steel structure, and her curiosity persists.
“I just want to know every single thing there is to know about this crane,” Sanchez said.
