Abstract: A student at a local high school was a part-time employee for an electric utility. About 2 weeks before the accident, the employee had sanded and primed some electrical panels in an energized switchyard at a hydroelectric generating station. He was sent back to the energized switchyard to paint the primed panels. To do this, he climbed a stepladder and was painting the top of a recloser panel. He apparently contacted the insulator stacks or open conductors located above the panel. (The two phases he contacted were energized at 34.5 kilovolts.) He was thrown off the ladder to the ground. He sustained massive burns and trauma to both arms and was hospitalized for his injuries. Both arms were permanently disabled.