A tower technician fell off of a tower to his death in Lamar Township, Pa., last Friday. Matthew Vance, 37, was working on a communication tower conjunction with a group of five technicians on the site. At this time it is unknown what circumstance led to this accident, only that Vance fell 90 feet to his death while working on the tower.
According to Wireless Estimator, Vance worked in the tower industry for more than a dozen years. It was unconfirmed what company he was working with at the time, though it is known that the tower was off of Route 80 and Rag Valley Rd., where there are antenna structures owned by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania State Police, Rivcom and Verizon. The area’s local paper also theorizes that “the work was likely being done in connection with an agreement between Clinton County and Vigilant Global Telecommunications Co., for the construction of a new Mount Rainsares 911 emergency communications tower.”
This is the latest tower-related death of 2015, but there have been many others this year, involving civilians, workers and workers on the job but offsite. First, a woman in Texas fell to her death in April while on a tower with her boyfriend, considering a tower climbing job herself. In the same month, a man committed suicide off a cell tower in California. In June, a small, two-person plane crashed into a cell tower, killing the pilot and injuring the passenger. The next month a group of five tower workers were killed in an auto crash while on the job; in August a thrill-seeking man in Rhode Island accidentally fell of a tower to his death; and this month a man in Brownsville, Texas fell to his death while fixing an antenna atop a water tower.
As always, our thoughts and prayers go out to the family and friends of the fallen climber. We will report more on this story as it develops.
