[BC] Oakland IA Tower death

[Rich Haan - home]

Leo has been a friend for close to 30 years.  This is a personal loss 
and a loss to the industry of a guy who was one of the best.  It's all 
the more difficult to hear because Leo was always a stickler for making 
sure things were done right and done safely.

Rich Haan
Sioux Center, IA


http://desmoinesregister.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060601/NEWS/60601003/1001T

ower company's owner among dead
BY JARED STRONG AND ABBY SIMONS
REGISTER STAFF WRITERS

June 1, 2006


Leo Deters, longtime owner of a Des Moines area tower service company, 
and two co-workers died Wednesday when they fell from a television 
broadcast tower in Pottawattamie County, authorities said today.

Deters, 57, of Norwalk, was on his way up to replace a strobe light on a 
Iowa Public Television broadcast tower, with employees Jason Galles, 27, 
of Des Moines, and Jon McWilliams, 19, of Cumming, said Sheriff Jeff Danker.

The crew's equipment apparently failed, said Danker who added that state 
officials will be on the scene to investigate this morning. The accident 
took place at 2:30 Wednesday afternoon northeast of Oakland.

Deters and his employees, who began working at the site around 7:30 
Wednesday morning, were more than 1,200 feet up the tower when they 
fell, Danker said.

The 1,500-foot tower is more than twice as tall as the 630-foot 801 
Grand building in downtown Des Moines, Iowa's tallest.

Two other workers witnessed the accident.

The deaths come less than a month after a 51-year-old Des Moines man, 
working for a Carlisle company, was killed in Lawton.

Ray Cole, president and chief operating officer of Citadel 
Communications, which owns WOI-TV in Des Moines, said his company relied 
on Deters Tower Service to perform maintenance. He had planned to call 
the business for repairs at the end of this week.

"The work that tower crews do is seldom seen and is rarely heralded, but 
they play a vital role in broadcasters' ability to serve their viewers 
and their listeners," Cole said.

Cole said the transition into digital radio and television broadcasting 
had resulted in an extraordinary amount of work performed on towers 
across Iowa and the nation. Smaller markets should complete the 
transition by July 1.

According to a 2001 study by the National Institute for Occupational 
Safety and Health, workers that construct and maintain these towers were 
at a higher risk of fatal falls.

NIOSH data estimates fatality rates of 49 to 468 deaths per 100,000 
workers. The average rate is five deaths per 100,000 workers across all 
industries.

The most recent data available from the Bureau of Labor Statistics said 
of 82 Iowans killed on the job in 2004, 14 died from falls ? third to 
transportation incidents and contact with objects and equipment.


On 5/31/2006 3:51 PM, Blake Bowers wrote:
> OMAHA, Neb. -- Three people fell off a television tower Wednesday 
> afternoon in eastern Pottawattamie County, officials said.
> 
> Initial reports listed the three people as critically hurt.
> 
> A call for help came at 2:43 p.m. The Pottawattamie County Sheriff's 
> Office told KETV NewsWatch 7 that a caller said three people had fallen 
> from the Iowa Public Television tower, five miles east of Oakland.
> 
> Those first at the scene said two of the people were not breathing. No 
> information is available yet on the identity of the people, and there is 
> no word on what they were doing at the tower site.
> 
> 
> 
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