Man tinkering with power line electrocuted

A man sustained second-degree burns after he was electrocuted while reportedly tampering with a power line before dawn yesterday in Caloocan City allegedly to make an illegal connection.

Romeo Gruela, 36, a resident of Ana Bustamante st., Barangay 43, 2nd Avenue, Caloocan City, is now confined at the Chinese General Hospital due to burns all over his body, police said.

According to SPO1 Victor Lalata, of the Caloocan City police Sub-station 2, Kit Delgado, 26, Gruela’s neighbor, saw Gruela unconscious on the pavement near an electric post at around 2 a.m.

Delgado told police investigators that she was awakened by a loud explosion outside their house.

She went outside to check the cause of the blast, she saw Gruela already lying on the ground unconscious with a live power line dangling from an electric post near him.

Despite appeals by the city government and the local fire department to the public to refrain from tampering with power lines, illegal connections remain rampant in Caloocan City, particularly in poor neighborhoods.

Last week, some 300 families lost their homes and spent Christmas on makeshift shelters when a fire caused by illegal power connections broke out in a densely populated area on Samson Road in Sangandaan, Caloocan City.