When construction on Los Angeles’ Wilshire Grand Hotel is completed, it will stand as the West Coast’s largest building. But, construction was stopped today when tragedy struck. An LA Times staff photographer, Mel Macon, happened to already be on assignment at the scene when a construction worker fell fifty-three stories to his death: At about noon, Melcon took a construction hoist from the 71st floor down to the first floor of the hotel, which will be the West Coast’s tallest building when it is completed. Melcon had taken only five steps off the hoist and was walking toward Wilshire Boulevard when he heard what sounded like “a large bag of cement hitting the ground.” He and two other workers looked around, but didn’t immediately see anything, Melcon said. Their view was obstructed by a large fence lined with a blue tarp. “No one thought it was a body,” Melcon said. “We heard no screams.” As Melcon and the others walked around the 3-foot-tall fence, he said, they spotted the mangled body of the construction worker. The worker was wearing an orange vest, which, unlike other vests on the construction site, did not identify the department he was assigned to, Melcon [...]