Abstract: A three-employee crew was installing an underground electric service cable for a newly constructed business. When the crew arrived, the employees removed approximately 305 meters of three-conductor, 1/0 service cable from the cable reel. (The utility pole was located between 290 and 305 meters from the business.) Once the employees cut the cable to length, they dug an excavation on the west side of the road. A section of conduit routed under the road had been installed previously. The employees unearthed the end of the conduit to pull the final 30 meters of cable beneath the road. The crew positioned an International Truck with an Effer 8200 crane boom on the east side of the road almost directly below a 14.4-kilovolt (phase-to-ground) overhead power line. The employees fed a fish tape through the conduit, secured a 25-millimeter-diameter nylon rope to the fish tape, and pulled the rope through the conduit. They attached the rope to the service cable with a conductor grip and a clevis. One of the employees began operating the crane boom, which was controlled from ground level, to pull the cable through the conduit. The crew foreman remained on the other side of the road at the excavation, feeding the service cable into the conduit. The third employee was positioned approximately 4.6 meters from the crane operator, holding the rope taut so that it would not interfere with the cable. When there was only about 2 meters of cable to pull, the crane boom contacted the eastern-most phase of the overhead power line at a point approximately 3 meters to the north of the crossarm on the pole. The crane operator was electrocuted. (The employee holding the rope had dropped it just before contact, as he noticed the proximity of the boom to the power line.)