By Times Colonist (Victoria)
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BRITISH COLUMBIA -- A 46-year-old Port McNeill man shocked investigators this week by surviving an industrial accident in which 138,000 volts of electricity passed through his body.
By comparison, a standard wall outlet in Canada carries 110 volts, which can kill a person, B.C. Hydro spokesman Elisha Moreno said recently.
"Apparently, he's in very good shape," she said, "which is quite miraculous."
"He should be dead," RCMP Sgt. Chris Stewart said.
The incident was one of two serious industrial accidents on Vancouver Island.
In the other, a 71-year-old man was killed by falling lumber at the Fields Sawmill in Courtenay shortly after 1 p.m. Monday, Comox Valley RCMP said. His name has not been released.
The Workers' Compensation Board is investigating both incidents.
In Port McNeill, police say the man was unloading fish crates from a flat-bed truck parked under power lines in a rural area southeast of the town near Beaver Cove about 2 p.m. Monday. He was standing beside the truck, working the controls for a mechanical arm, when it either touched or came too close to the power lines.
The electricity arced downward, sending 138,000 volts through the man and cutting power to 3,000 customers on northern Vancouver Island for about three hours.
The man suffered severe burns, but otherwise appears fine.
"He's stable and he's alive and he's communicating with people," Stewart said. "Everybody's shaking their head."
Stewart said the electricity entered the man's right hand and exited both feet. He was taken to Port McNeill hospital, but will likely be transferred to Campbell River.
"The man is a fortunate, fortunate individual," Stewart said. "The Good Lord was shining on him recently."
Stewart admitted to being "puzzled" by the man's decision to unload the crates beneath powerlines, and urged people on the job to "be aware of your surroundings."
Moreno added that people rarely survive contact with high voltage lines.
"That's one of the reasons why we have such extensive safety programs that we issue to students and to contractors and to the general industry working in and around the lines, because in most cases it is a fatal situation," she said.
In Courtenay, police, the WCB, and the B.C. Coroners Service are still investigating the cause of the accident.
"It appears that there was a bundle of lumber that broke open while it was being loaded and it may have fallen on the deceased," Corporal Andrew Isles said.
Donna Freeman of the WCB said the man who died at the sawmill was an employee of a subcontractor, Island Pacific Transport Ltd.
The WCB's critical incident response team has been dispatched to speak with workers and the employer or anyone who would like to talk about what happened, she said.
The workplace injury rate in British Columbia has declined steadily in the past 10 years to an all-time low of 3.2 injuries per 100 person years of employment.
"The reduction in the injury rate has been, I believe, because of the concerted efforts of the WCB, employers and workers," Freeman said. "The WCB has targeted high risk sectors and worked closely with them to focus on prevention strategies."
The board also targets and works with individual firms that have higher rates of injury than their industry average.
Meanwhile, the fatality rate has remained relatively stable in recent years, but is lower than it was 10 years ago.
In 2002, 0.9 people died from an accident or disease for every 10,000 people working full-time that year. The death rate was 1.3 in 1990.
Freeman said the board recognizes that fatalities in the forest sector continue to be too high. But WCB chairman Douglas Enns is currently heading a Forest Safety Task Force to examine the issue, she said.
