Abstract: Two employees of a rural electric cooperative had been assigned to clear a right-of-way for a new overhead power line. They encountered two adjacent trees with the broken top of one tree lodged horizontally in the other about 27.4 meters above the ground. The two employees decided to cut both trees simultaneously in an attempt to bring the dangerous broken portion down with both trees. The employee who was cutting the tree with the broken top portion was approximately 11.6 meters away from the other tree. The other tree, which was being cut by the crew leader, shifted and fell prematurely, dislodging the broken top, which fell onto the first employee, who was crushed to death. The crew leader shouted warnings, but the first employee apparently could not hear because of noise from the chain saws and his hearing protection. (The injured employee's hardhat was destroyed in the incident.) The broken tree top was approximately 14.6 meters in length with an average diameter of 150 millimeters. The tree was a hard maple and its weight was estimated to weigh 457 kilograms.