One injured after bucket truck tips over with employee in the basket

West Columbia, SC (Paul Kirby) – One utility company employee has been transported to Palmetto Richland after the bucket truck he was working from tipped over. It fell when its downrigger broke through the lid of a septic tank causing the truck to fall. The extent of the man’s injuries was not currently available.

Lexington County EMS and the fire service were dispatched to the call in the area of Dreher Road and Crapps Avenue close to the City of West Columbia Wednesday sometime around 9:30 a.m. They arrived to find the downrigger, an arm that extents to a foot-plate on the ground that helps stabilizes the truck while it works high above the ground, had inadvertently been placed on the buried lid of a septic tank. Once the arm with the bucket was raised and the employee started working, the shift of the weight to the downrigger as the boom swung applied enough weight for the lid to break, tipping the truck. The employee was thrown to the ground as it fell.

The patient who fell in the bucket was treated and transported by EMS. The fire service stood by for a period but after 10:15 a.m. Wednesday, they were leaving the scene in the hands of utility employees who were waiting on a wrecker to remove the truck from the tank.