Abstract: Vandals had stolen a flag. An employee was swapping the short end of the flagpole rope, which was near the top of the flagpole, where the vandals had left it. He was standing on the 3-foot-high base of the flagpole, trying to snag the rope with a 33-foot-long, 0.5-inch-diameter galvanized steel pipe. After a couple of unsuccessful attempts, the employee hooked the rope, and the pipe began to fall towards an overhead power line. Another employee yelled a warning to the first employee, who let go of the pipe but received an electric shock and fell back off the flagpole base, landing on his back. He was transported to a hospital, where he was treated for four small electrical burns to his right leg near his knee and for a cut to the back of his head, which had hit a piece of granite on the ground. He received three stitches to the cut on his head. (Singed hair on the back of his left wrist was further evidence of the electric shock he received.)