2 July 2012 Last updated at 16:05 ET

Shard worker stuck on 72nd floor

The window cleaner was stuck on the 72nd floor of the 1,015ft building

A maintenance worker was stuck on the 72nd floor of the Shard in south London in windy conditions.

London Fire Brigade was called at 14:15 BST to reports of a "window cleaner's cradle in a precarious position", but engineers soon made the cradle safe.

A spokesman for the Shard confirmed there was a worker in the cradle, adding: "The wind got up a bit more than we were anticipating."

Mace, a contractor for the Shard, said wind speeds were "within safe limits".

The 309.6m (1,015ft) skyscraper in St Thomas Street in Southwark will be officially opened on Thursday.

The 95-storey building, which will be occupied up to the 78th floor, is the tallest in western Europe.

Ten firefighters were sent to the scene but soon after they arrived the situation was resolved by on-site engineers, the fire brigade said.

On Twitter London Fire Brigade said: "We can all now breathe a sigh of relief".

An ambulance had also been on standby.

'Swinging wildly'

The spokesman for the Shard said: "The wind got up a bit more than we were anticipating."

He added: "He wasn't hurt.

"I think it was seen from a helicopter and people panicked unnecessarily."

A spokesman for Mace, the main contractor working on the site, said: "We can confirm that the wind speeds were well within safe limits and that the building maintenance unit was operating in the right way.

"Nobody was injured and the operatives were able to resume work."

Witness Neil Walsh, 30, a marketing executive from Dartford, Kent, said: "I happened to notice that the window cleaning box was swinging wildly.

"It was dangling from quite a thin arm and was a few feet away from the building itself, rocking left, right, up and down.

"The last few days have been windy and it must have been worse up there.

"I filmed it thinking the box was empty. That was a worry in itself, without me realising there was someone inside, probably cowering in a corner and hanging on for dear life."

Update 3 July 2012: This story has been amended since it was first published to make clear the worker involved was a maintenance worker, not a window cleaner.