When lives are on the line, it’s vital that Consumers Energy linemen act quickly and skillfully to ensure everyone’s safety. In an emergency situation, our linemen must know the safest and most practical way to rescue their partner if they are rendered unconscious after making contact with an energized line.

Every year, our linemen undergo pole top rescue training with assistance from the Iowa Association of Electric Cooperatives’ (IAEC) Safety and Loss Control instructors. Each lineman must successfully complete the testing process. Pictured here are the operations crew practicing pole top rescue techniques.

As an OSHA mandated safety training requirement, the training is designed to evaluate each lineman on their ability to properly rescue an injured and/or stranded lineman. Each lineman must balance their skills with safety, climb a pole, and rescue a 185-pound training mannequin. The lineman must then secure the mannequin using ropes and pulleys to safely deliver them back to the ground.

In a perfect world, this is one skill that one hopes a lineman never needs to use. But if they do, the training is an opportunity for the linemen to prepare and hone their skills if the need should ever arise.