Injured CUB lineman recovering after electrical shock

Posted at 10:18 pm April 10, 2019
By Oak Ridge Today Staff Leave a Comment

Information from WYSH Radio

A Clinton Utilities Board lineman was recovering in the hospital on Wednesday, one day after being injured while on the job in Clinton on Tuesday.

Shortly before noon Tuesday, a CUB employee identified by his daughter as Mike Bavousett was part of a crew working to replace old conductors with newer ones as part of an upgrade project. The crew was in the process of splicing a piece of wire into the conductor to get the wire down to the pulling equipment on the ground when the conductor came loose from the splice and slipped up into an energized conductor overhead where Bavousset was working. Officials are still working to identify exactly what went wrong. No one else was injured in the incident.

In a Facebook post on Tuesday afternoon, his daughter wrote that “some of his body was burned from the electricity. It went through his stomach and out of his shoulder.” That post also indicated that he is expected to make a full recovery.

CUB Operations Manager Rodney Quarles said the electrical burn is the first incident like this that he has seen in nearly two decades with the utility.

The Tennessee Occupational Safety and Health Adminstration–or TOSHA–has been notified and is investigating Tuesday’s incident.

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