Sordid clambake
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I guess he got a little more than his PUD regulated.A man reportedly caught fire and and was found dead after entering a restricted area at a Clark County PUD regulator station Wednesday.
Anybody seen Dins tooling about in a Jeep Cherokee?Police seek electrocuted man's vehicle
Published Friday, October 13th, 2006
By Lynne Lynch, Herald staff writer
Police and the family of a Pasco ironworker who was electrocuted at a Clark County PUD electric substation are looking for his 1991 white Jeep Cherokee.
The person who has the vehicle may have been with Bruce Wallace, 47, when he died Wednesday, said Sgt. Tim Bieber, of the Clark County Sheriff's Office.
His body was found inside a fenced substation about three miles north of La Center after a person driving by that afternoon spotted smoke.
Police suspect Wallace was trying to steal copper wire, according to a news release from the sheriff's office, but a family member questioned that.
His sister, Catherine Hammack of Kennewick, said Wallace was working at a construction job in Salem, Ore. Relatives had last spoken with him Monday, she said.
Hammack said her family didn't know what he was doing at the substation, and as far as they know he didn't have any problems with the law or prior arrests.
"We're just like at a loss," Hammack said. "We just think whoever he was with just got scared when he was electrocuted and just took off and left him."
Mick Shutt of Clark PUD said police suspect Wallace was trying to remove copper ground wires but came into contact with a 7,200-volt live wire leading to a voltage regulator. A hole had been cut in the 8-foot fence topped with barbed wire that surrounds the substation.
A sign posted at the station warns of danger from high voltage, said Shutt, adding that Wallace's death is a first for the utility at any of its stations.
Shutt also said that when ground wires are disabled, utility workers can be at risk for electrocution because they may not know wires have been moved.
"(It's) a very serious issue for the electrical industry," he said.
Bieber, of the sheriff's office, said copper thefts have become common in Clark County because of the metal's high price as scrap. Thefts have been most common at home construction sites.
On Thursday, services hadn't been scheduled for Wallace, who has one child.
An autopsy is expected to be done today, said Brian Miller, an investigator with the Clark County Medical Examiner's Office.