BY KEITH LACEY
Leo Kilganon?s tearfully told a coroner?s jury his first day on the job with a local construction company will haunt him for the rest of his life.
The day after being hired by Consbec Inc., and during his first shift on Oct. 14, 2000, Kilganon was working with Yvon Lachance, 26.
Lachance was electrocuted when he accidentally moved an aluminum ladder making contact with an overhead power line carrying 7,200 volts of power.
Kilganon and Lachance were teamed up to remove weeping tile used to cover phone and cable lines several feet beneath the power lines. The weeping tiles were used to protect cable and phone lines from being damaged by flying rock as Consbec was blasting rock at a nearby quarry.
The incident took place just off Highway 17 near Beaver Lake, about 40 kilometres north of Sudbury.
Consbec had been hired as a sub-contractor by Pioneer Construction to drill and blast the quarry as part of a road construction project.
Consbec workers had installed the weeping tile over the cable and phone lines in the spring of 2000. The weeping tile was being removed because the highway project was finished.
Lachance had worked with another Consbec employee taking down the weeping tile on Oct. 13 and returned to the work site the following day with Kilganon.
The plan was for Lachance, who had worked for four years with Consbec, to climb the ladder and remove the weeping tile while Kilganon ensured the ladder was in a secure position.
The ladder is supposed to be secured to a hydro pole, but he and Lachance at times placed the ladder directly on the phone and cable line, said Kilganon.
?The ladder looked safe to me,? he said.
Even though he hadn?t been given any safety training prior to his first shift, he was taking turns on top of the ladder trying to pull the weeping tile away from the phone and cable lines, said Kilganon.
Lachance was at the top of the ladder when the tragic accident took place, said Kilganon.
?I was at the bottom of the ladder?I don?t know why?but he moved the ladder alone?when he did that, he started shaking,? said Kilganon, who broke down in tears recalling the horrible accident.
?At first I didn?t know why, then I looked up and I noticed the ladder was touching the (hydro) wire. He started shaking. I thought he was joking.?
Residing coroner Dr. Shelagh McRae gave Kilganon time to recompose after he broke down in tears. Lachance?s widow consoled Kilganon during a break in proceedings.
When the inquest resumed, Kilganon testified as he rushed over to his work partner, Lachance fell over onto the ground and the ladder fell on top of him, said Kilganon.
?He was looking at me and he was breathing hard,? said Kilganon.
He tried calling out his first name, but Lachance couldn?t move and looked at him with a blank stare and knew his partner had been hurt badly, said Kilganon, who again broke down in tears.
Kilganon then rushed to a nearby home to get some help, but no one was home. A truck stopped and the driver returned with him to the scene to comfort Lachance and call for emergency assistance.
The extention aluminum ladder he and Lachance were using was extended to its full length at 24 feet, said Kilganon.
He didn?t recall why the ladder was stretched out to its maximum length as the weeping tile covering the cable and phone lines wasn?t that far off the ground.
While Consbec did have a training manual for its employees, this was his first day on the job and there was no official orientation or training about working near power lines, said Kilganon.
Last June, Consec was fined $218,000 after pleading guilty to one count under the provincial Occupational Health and Safety Act. The charge was failing to ensure a ladder was not brought near power lines.
Jeff Walker, a general superintendent with Consbec, said Lachance was a hard-working, diligent and safety-conscious employee who had been promoted several times during his four years with the company.
Lachance had trained directly under him for the first several months on the job. He had worked with Lachance placing and removing weeping tile from cable and power lines when Lachance was first hired in 1996, said Walker.
Consbec specializes in drilling, blasting and truck driving and each job dictates the training each worker receives, said Walker. Ontario is the only province in Canada that doesn?t require a certificate for employees involved in construction blasting. At the time of this incident, Consbec employees who worked as blasters were trained by experienced company personnel, he said.
Since Lachance?s death, every employee hired by Consbec must attain a ?common core? certificate approved by the Ministry of Labour, said Walker.
The company?s safety manual does have sections on proper use of ladders and states no ladder should be raised three feet above a top landing and every ladder should in inspected for defects before using and taken out of service if defective, he said.
Most ladders are wooden and used in ditches and trenches, but there are aluminum and fibreglass ladders available for above-ground work, he said. It?s well-known aluminum ladders conduct electricity, but there was no formal company policy about what ladders to use when employees work near power lines.
