ElectricityPole-top rescue: Live-line bare-hand work from a bucket truck: the truck's lower controls bring the injured worker down (night)
Live-line bare-hand work from a bucket truck: the truck's lower controls bring the injured worker down. It happens at night. A line worker is hurt at the top of a pole after an electric contact. You stop and think, protect yourself first, climb with your fall protection, free your coworker from the line, bring them down and start CPR, because after an electric shock CPR works best within 4 minutes. It is the rescue OSHA requires every overhead line crew to be trained in.
Free to startThis scenario
- Live-line bare-hand work from a bucket truck: the truck's lower controls bring the injured worker down.
- It happens at night.
The steps
- Before the job, hold the job briefing with the crew.
- Make sure the field crew has at least two people trained in first aid and CPR.
- Stop and think clearly about what needs to be done.
- Decide how to protect yourself as well as your injured coworker.
- Treat the worker as possibly still in contact with a live conductor, especially at lower voltages.
- Climb to the rescue position with your fall protection.
- Use the company's rescue equipment and procedure to reach the worker.
- Bring the worker down to a safe place where first aid and CPR can be given.
- Place the worker in a position where CPR and first aid can start as soon as possible.
- Give CPR within 4 minutes of the shock.
Safety rules that stop the station
- After 4 minutes, CPR has limited usefulness.
To pass
- Rescuers are trained and have shown they can climb the pole and make the rescue with the company's equipment and procedures.
- No single rescue method is set by law: each company develops its own techniques and trains its crews in them.
- Exposed workers are no more than 4 minutes from someone trained in first aid and CPR.
Official source
Pole Top and Manhole Rescue Requirements (Electric Power eTool)
OSHA publishes its Electric Power eTool free: what pole-top and manhole rescue require and how rescuers must act.
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