Stranded man cuts power poles to draw attention

[The Straight Story]

Stranded man cuts power poles to draw attention

Wollaston Lake is in Saskatchewan's northeast corner.Wollaston Lake is in Saskatchewan's northeast corner. (CBC)

A man stranded in the bush in northern Saskatchewan was rescued last week after chopping down four power poles — knocking out electricity to surrounding communities.

The incident left several hundred people in Wollaston Lake and Hatchet Lake Denesuline Nation without power for more than 30 hours, but it paved the way for a man to be saved by a SaskPower crew.

"He was found under his boat in a very distressed state, so essentially he was stranded for a number of days and just desperate for people to know where he was," SaskPower spokesman James Parker said.

The man reported he had been on a boat on the lake when he hit bad weather. He ended up stranded in the bush, with no way to communicate with the outside world, Parker said.

Read more: http://www.cbc.ca/canada/saskatchewan/story/2010/05/31/sk-power-pole-survival-1005.html#ixzz0pcd6tEFr

[Arugula Latte]

1. Wow -- That was a smart thing to do.

[TwilightGardener]

2. Well, some people with spoiled food in the freezer aren't going to be

too happy with him.

[trotsky]

4. Or perishable medicine. Or electrical medical equipment.

Granted, in that situation you'd want to make sure you have a generator in the case of a normal power failure, but still. Smart thinking on the guy's part, but it sure does cause problems for a whole lot of innocent folks.

[Lorien]

6. Death or spoiled frozen peas

hmmmm....

[NoSheep]

7. ditto

[Donnachaidh]

15. tough shit. Food can be replaced - a life cannot.

what a selfish way of thinking! :wow:

[Rosa Luxemburg]

3. did he bring an axe with him?

[daggahead]

5. The big difference ...

The Crown utility is still investigating what happened.

Occasionally, it tries to recoup damages from vandalism, but in this case it is taking the circumstances into account, Parker said.


Here in the US, he would have been thrown in jail right away.

[Shadow Creature]

8. he should pay

for at least some of the damage.

The posted story doesn't say how far he was from one of these "communities" that lost power.

[daggahead]

9. Yes, he should pay something back.

But, my point is that his ass would have been hauled to jail right away if this were in the US. He would have been branded as an eco-terrorist, a la Edward Abbey's Monkey Wrench Gang or ELF.

[Liberal_in_LA]

10. A few years ago, stranded hikers set a fire to attract help. Fire grew out of control

[FLPanhandle]

11. Chopping down 4 power poles would take a lot of energy

Why not just follow them? Seems like it would take less effort.

[Shadow Creature]

12. hhmmm

Yes it does!

[intheflow]

13. The terrain may have been too rugged or blocked by water.

The lake he was on is 60 miles long and 40 miles wide. On Google maps it looks like there are two small towns on the southern end, but the northern end looks like a whole lotta wilderness with more islands than lake. If he was on one of those islands and his boat inoperable, he couldn't just follow the poles on foot.

Edited to add: Pretty crappy reporting in the OP that they didn't answer even these basic questions.

[pipi_k]

14. I've often thought of doing something similar

in stores when I've needed help finding something and there's not ONE solitary employee around...

Light up a cigarette and see who comes running out of the woodwork then.


That was when I used to smoke though. Now I just think of falling down in the middle of the aisle and having a temper tantrum.


:7

[badgerpup]

17. Saw a special on 'store security' once...

...this was about Home Depot. If you can't get any help, just linger in an aisle. Look at the stuff...ANY stuff...and then look around yourself and try to look suspicious.
:hide:

They'll catch you on the security cam and send somebody to check you out to make sure you're not trying to steal anything...
then you can ask your question. :evilgrin:

[noamnety]

19. OMG

That is the story of my life in home depot.

stare indecisively at screw # 4, then screw #6, back to the first, try to figure out what the difference is, look around self-consciously to see if anyone is noticing that I'm such an idiot it takes me 10 minutes to make a decision about something so inane, wonder why there is no screw #5, think about whether a screw is really the best solution or whether instead I should use a nail.

It never occurred to me that's why the home depot folks are always offering me help.

[AsahinaKimi]

16. Sounds like

A Macgyver episode.

[ohheckyeah]

18. Are people really upset because they were inconvenienced

by a man doing what he did to save his life? Seriously? People so often suck.