Communications worker electrocuted working on utility pole

STERLING – A telecommunications company worker was electrocuted while working on a utility pole Tuesday on 23rd and Locust streets.

Another worker, Jordan R.M. Zulauf, 23, of West Chicago, was injured and airlifted to OSF Saint Anthony Medical Center in Rockford, where he was in critical condition.

Sterling Police Chief Tim Morgan said no positive identification has been made on the worker who was killed.

The men were working for Zucru Communications, based in West Chicago.

Emergency workers were called to the scene, near the Circle K convenience store, just after noon.

Amy Glover, an assistant manager at Circle K, said she called 911 after a customer told her what had happened.

"One of our regular lunch customers came running in here and said, 'You have to come out here quick,'" Glover said. "He said he thought the whole truck was going to blow up."

ComEd is working with local authorities to investigate the incident.

"What we know now is that they were working on the utility lines, pulling fiber-optic cable, and the bucket on the truck came into contact with the power lines," Deputy Fire Chief Mike Dettman said.

The accident caused a power outage that covered an area from 29th Street north to 10th Street south, and Locust to Dillon Avenue east and west, a ComEd spokeswoman said.

She said 814 customers experienced the outage at 12:12 p.m., and power was restored to 99 percent of them by 1:38 p.m.