As the crane tipped over, Mr Bell saw its driver dive from his cab and then the large boom slam through the house and the upstairs bedroom where he had seen Mr Lim through a window just seconds earlier.
"He just stood up - it was someone coming out of the debris," said Mr Bell.
The end of the boom also crashed into a second house behind Mr Lim's home, and the 12-tonne boat landed on a small lawn beside the wrecked house.
Although the crane driver suffered a leg injury and was taken to hospital, Mr Lim escaped unharmed, as did his sister Eunice and mother Lay-Yan Lee.
The driver is not believed to have been seriously injured.
Mrs Cashmore said at home last night: "I'm shattered - it's just horrible."
A neighbour who shares the right-of-way with the Lim family, Richard Scully, said it was "a miracle" the young man had survived.
"When they [his family] were yelling to him upstairs I really thought we were going to be taking a body out of there," Mr Scully said.
"And then his head popped out of this tiny little triangle that was left of the room.
"How the crane did not crush the whole top level of the house, how he survived that, I will never know - but the house is just a mess."
Mr Scully rushed into the house, where he was joined by a second man, who helped him to get Mr Lim's sister and mother out.
"The two of us were in the house, dragging them out, because they wouldn't come out - they were in shock."
He said a third person put a ladder against the side of the house to bring Mr Lim down from the ruins of his bedroom.
Another onlooker said the crane dropped into the bedroom "like a guillotine."
The young man's father, Heng Juay (HJ) Lim, rushed home from his job as purchasing and inventory manager at the Glenfield-based Much Moore (formerly Kiwi) ice cream company and the family were last night understood to have been put up in accommodation by the crane contracting company, Auckland Cranes.
Manager Derek Manns, whose company is a subsidiary of Waikato Crane Services, said he could not comment while the incident was under investigation.
Mr Scully said he had no idea what had caused the mishap, although he had been watching the crane try to manoeuvre the boat above the right-of-way.
"They had been moving it around and there was an almighty crack and I dropped my phone which I had been taking photos on."
He is offering the photos to Worksafe NZ, which is investigating.
Station officer Graeme Butter of the Fire Service in Albany said early reports indicated the boat had been caught by strong, erratic wind gusts, causing the crane to topple.
It appeared the vessel was almost five tonnes heavier than the crane crew had expected.
"The crane was out in position - it was sitting down - they've picked up what they thought was a 7.5-tonne boat," Mr Butter said.
Mid-way through the lift, a reading on the crane told its driver the boat was closer to 12 tonnes, and he decided to put it back on the truck which delivered it to the right-of-way yesterday morning.
Another neighbour watching the operation said the boat had swung around to be settled into position "when they decided to bring it back towards the truck".
"Then all of a sudden the crane started to tip and I don't know what caused it, but of course the boat went with it - it happened quite slowly," she said.
The woman, who did not want to be named, said the crane crew spent "a few hours" setting up the operation.
"They seemed to take a while to be certain they were happy where the crane was - they wanted to get it right," she said.
Mr Bell said his daughter and her husband had just recently bought the boat through Trade Me.
"That was their retirement," he said. "It was going to be their pleasure craft - it has never been in the water."
