Man zapped by live bus cable files claim
By Harriet Chiang
CHRONICLE LEGAL AFFAIRS WRITER
Ben Fernandez was walking in downtown San Francisco recently when he saw what has become a common occurrence: the poles on a San Francisco Municipal Railway trolley bus becoming disconnected from the overhanging power lines.
What happened next was anything but common. One of the cables fell on top of Fernandez, sending 600 volts of electricity through his body, the 46-year-old San Francisco man said Tuesday.
Fernandez was hospitalized for three days, but he lived to tell about the June 25 incident at Fourth and Market streets. Now, though, he says he is paying a price. In a claim filed Tuesday against the city, Fernandez says he now suffers from seizures, double vision, headaches and pain in his right leg, making it difficult for him to walk–all a result of being jolted by electricity.
“I’m pretty blessed to be living,” he said as he prepared to see yet another doctor about his condition. But he said that he had decided to waste no time in filing his claim because he needed help. “I can’t drive, I can’t see that well, I can’t walk on my own,” said Fernandez, a full-time instructor in pharmacy technology at the Bryman College. “It’s depressing.”
In his claim, he says he has incurred more than $50,000 in medical bills and has been told by doctors not to return to work for another week. |
San Francisco lawyer Arnold Laub, who filed the claim for Fernandez, said the incident illustrated the systemwide problems with the Muni. “We don’t even have pedestrian safety in the city,” he said. “We have cables falling off the line.”
Matt Dorsey, spokesman for the San Francisco city attorney’s office, said he hadn’t seen Fernandez’s claim but promised that it would be investigated thoroughly. “We take every claim seriously,” he said.
Overhead wires occasionally do break, for a variety of reasons., according to Muni spokeswoman Maggie Lynch. She couldn’t go into specifics because of the pending claim, but she said that the wires were regularly maintained and checked.
Fernandez said he was taking a break from his job around 3 p.m. and had gone out to get a soda when he was struck by the cable as he was crossing Fourth Street.
He recalls falling to the ground and people screaming at him not to move because of the cables on the ground next to him. An ambulance rushed him to San Francisco General Hospital, where he said he had spent three days being treated. Before the incident, he said, he was independent and active. Now, with all his pain and neurological problems, he said, “I get frustrated. I get sad.”
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