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WATCH ABOVE: A pedestrian was shocked when he saw a flying piece of metal fall from the Centre Sheraton on Rene-Levesque in Montreal. The aluminium piece fell from a scafold and landed across the street. Rachel Lau looks into the incident.

MONTREAL – James Derick was walking down a busy Montreal street Wednesday when something caught his eye: a metal object falling off the Sheraton Hotel.

“They [the construction workers] dropped something,” said Derick.

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“A piece of metal landed in the closest lane, bounced over the median and landed on the other side.”

The metal piece bounced across the six lane intersection before being picked up by a pedestrian and brought back to the hotel.

Derick phoned the police to report the incident, but said he was a told to call the City of Montreal debris collection service.

“Stuff falling from the sky, it’s not like somebody dropped a screwdriver from a balcony,” he said.

“It fell from the eighth floor or something. It doesn’t matter what you drop from that height, somebody will get injured or cause a car accident.”

The piece fell just one block away from where Saad Syed was killed by a falling metal plate Monday.

READ MORE: Language teacher killed by falling metal in downtown Montreal

Derick said he’s shocked that so many accidents have occurred during the last few weeks, and he’s only glad no one was injured or killed this time.

“Security from the hotel came out to investigate. Nobody got hurt, but someone could have been killed,” said Derick.

The Sheraton Centre sent a response to Global News on Thursday night to confirm that the hotel administration is taking the incident very seriously and has launched a “detailed” investigation.

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“It includes the involvement of the contracted companies who use the exterior maintenance lift to clean the hotel’s windows and to work on hotel renovation projects,” said Catherine Velie, the director of operations for the hotel in an email.

“In addition, the hotel will be reviewing all standards and protocols with our vendors and Corporate Safety and Security team.

Velie also confirmed that the lift is inspected every year “by a third party expert and must pass a detailed certification process to continue operation.”

The company who was hired to wash the windows of the Sheraton told Global News that they weren’t there on that day.

A spokesperson from Quebec’s workplace health and safety board (CSST) confirmed the details of what happened.

“A window repair company was using the Sheraton scaffold for their work,” said Dominique David.

“A metal bucket holder had been left there by a window washing company.”

The bucket holder was not being used and it fell from the scaffolding.

“When they work high up, they have to make sure that none of the equipment can fall,” David noted.

“One way to do this is to attach the equipment.”

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Derick said he no longer feel safe walking on the streets of Montreal, especially as he believes city officials only seem to care when someone gets hurt.

“It seems almost safer to walk in the traffic than walk on the sidewalk.”

– This story has been updated to include a statement from the Sheraton Centre