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Truck yanks down power lines

Nearly 200 customers, including nudist resort Caliente, lose power after the incident along U.S. 41.

By CHUIN-WEI YAP
Published July 15, 2006

LAND O'LAKES - A landscaping delivery truck accidentally took down power lines on U.S. 41 just north of Ehren Cutoff at 9:45 a.m. Friday.

No one was hurt, but nearly 200 customers in the area went without power for varying periods of time, Progress Energy spokeswoman Cherie Jacobs said.

Those affected included the 100-acre Caliente nudist resort, but not for long.

"We were only out for about 25 to 30 minutes," Chuck Foster, Caliente's vice president, said just past noon. "Everything's back on now."

U.S. 41 was closed for nearly two hours, as Florida Highway Patrol troopers redirected traffic through Ehren Cutoff, which connects to State Road 52 to the north.

Paul Sova, 33, was delivering a stack of mulch and plants when his truck caught the lines as he turned right from Little Lake Thomas Road.

"He forgot to put the boom down," Trooper J.M. Hollis said.

The boom was unsecured and rose as the truck turned, a patrol report said. Sova swerved, leaving a long trail of tire marks as he skidded into the median.

"The wire was drooping down," Sova said. "It jerked me around, and I almost flipped."

There was about $300,000 worth of damage to the pole and power lines, the patrol said. The truck was undamaged.

Sova faced charges of careless driving and commercial height violation.

The incident snapped a power pole in two and blocked some workers from getting to their destinations.

"My shop is just down there, and I can't get there," said Donald King, a deliveryman, pointing north on U.S. 41. "But, hey, I get paid by the hour."

[Last modified July 14, 2006, 22:16:29]