Abstract: At approximately 2:30 p.m. on September 12, 2002, Employee #1 was supervising a four-man crew that was erecting antennas and coaxial cable on a 400 ft communications tower. After eating lunch, Employee #1 told a coworker that he wanted to be winched up the tower rather than climb the ladder. In addition to hoisting the supervisor, the crew was lifting a coaxial cable that would have been 480 ft long when raised to the top of the tower. The new 0.5-in. poly-dac rope used to winch up Employee #1 and the cable failed when they were at a height of approximately 340 ft. Employee #1 fell approximately 50 ft before bouncing off part of the structure. His fall stopped at the 290 ft level, and the coworkers could see that he had sustained severe head injuries from the impact and that he was probably dead. Emergency Services responded and lowered Employee #1's body to the ground. He was declared dead at the scene by a Justice of the Peace. The rope line was marked on the reel as having a working strength of 417 lb. The weight on the load line at the top of the tower would have been 655 lb, 480 lb for the cable plus 175 lb for Employee #1. This resulted in an overload of 238 lb more than the line was rated to withstand.