Richard Padgett
Journeyman Lineman
Progress Energy
Asheville, North Carolina, U.S.

Richard Padgett credits a video he saw in the thrid grade with helping him decide to become a lineman.

“I remember seeing a video about power-line safety,” Padgett recalls of his third-grade classroom experience. “It showed the power crews showing up on the scene, getting the power turned off and getting it back up, and I thought that was really cool. And then as I got older, I knew I loved being outdoors. And the Lord blessed me and found a way for me to do that, to build a career where I could help people and be outdoors.”

Between third grade and his eventual apprenticeship in 1984 with what was then called Carolina Power & Light, Padgett took some electronics courses in college and kept an eye on the local electric utility as a possible career path. Just out of college, he met a good friend in his church who was the supervisor of a line crew. His friend let him know there were job openings for meter readers. Padgett applied, interviewed and, he says, after about a year, got the job. He worked out of his hometown of Black Mountain, North Carolina, for about 10 months as a meter reader, and then took advantage of an opening for electrical line work.

“We started with training, a good deal of training,” Padgett recalls. “We had training for climbing, basic electricity, hands-on tasks, driving the big trucks and trailers, getting your commercial driver's license and more technical things. We learned about hot-line works, capacitor banks, underground systems. It was generally six months working, three weeks classroom [and so on] for a period of about five years.”

Electrical line work in western North Carolina at the time, Padgett notes, was primarily new construction and maintenance, including setting poles and building new lines, both overhead and underground. Most of the work was local or regional, as utilities did not travel outside their home systems much back then. “The travel came later,” Padgett relates. “The main reason we do it now is that so many companies have cut their labor force, so during storms or emergencies they need to reach out and add more hands.”

Those storms or emergencies create some of the most lasting memories and greatest rewards for linemen, Padgett says. “Some of the most exciting times are when we go off-system in the aftermath of a hurricane or ice storm,” he notes. “It is great to experience the gratitude that comes in being able to go in and rebuild a system and get the power back on. The personal interactions with customers in these situations are great. There is nothing like being able to put a street back on and watch people cheer.”

Back on the subject of his more routine daily work, Padgett notes several key changes that have occurred over the years he has spent on the lines. One is the pace of work. “It is a lot faster-paced world, and there are fewer people, so there are a lot more tasks,” Padgett comments. “Now we have computers in the trucks and you have to do your own accounting and you have to be more diversified. You have to keep all your own time on the computer, and know more about more different things.”

The flip side to increases in technology, he adds, is that today's younger linemen may not always get the same on-the-job learning opportunities their predecessors did. “We have all these high-voltage lines with advanced electronics on them, but it can be a double-edged sword,” he argues. “We can de-energize feeders and put on hot tags and protect linemen, but doing all that takes a certain amount of knowledge away from that lineman. Linemen today may never have to know how to physically climb and isolate on each side. Now they can isolate everything via a switch in the central office.”

Padgett expresses some concern about younger linemen coming into the field without the same goals or expectations he and his peers had when they started. “You don't see as many young guys coming on board that have the concept of being a lineman until they retire,” he says. “They may be excited to have the job for a year or two, and then they want to get off call and do something else. You don't see the same hunger and desire. I truly believe that every generation gets a bit more spoiled with technology.”

This newer generation of linemen, Padgett adds, will benefit by avoiding some of the physical toll that older linemen have endured, but they may also miss out on the special camaraderie that his generation has enjoyed. “We truly are a battalion of men out there,” Padgett says. “Working with all the guys I have worked with has truly been one of my most wonderful experiences.”

Thomas Machi
Journeyman Lineman
Detroit Edison
Detroit, Michigan, U.S.

With nearly 30 years "In the Hooks," as he puts it, Thomas Machi has seen and done quite a bit, but hastens to add that he is “still learning.”

“When I started out, I was in the storage department, working in a warehouse where they had the line crew,” Machi explains. “I delivered equipment to them and was fascinated by what these guys do, and eventually I got into a four-year apprenticeship program. You work on an apprentice crew for six months and you do almost all dead work, building new leads, setting poles; you do all the ‘bull work.’ Then you work as an apprentice with a journeyman for four years, and then you spend another four to six years until you come into your own as a journeyman. There are so many variables in this trade that after 30 years you are still learning.”

Machi describes an interesting paradox within electric utility line work. On the one hand, he says, some of the materials and construction methods being used have not changed in decades. “You have more electronic switching, but the industry changes very slowly,” Machi observes. “The stuff you put in has to last 50 to 60 years. A lot of the reclosing devices are the same as they were years ago.”

On the other hand, Machi notes significant changes. “When I started, we had six construction crews, and there was a lot of building going on in southeastern Michigan,” Machi says. “There was so much climbing. Nowadays, everyone goes out with at least one bucket truck. It makes the job a lot safer, and it has changed the way the work is done. With all the climbing, linemen used to last maybe 10 or 15 years. Now they are going to last a lot longer. I don't consider myself an old-timer yet, but the knees and backs do go out.”

Other changes include the composition of the crews. “Crews were bigger back then,” he notes. “At Edison [today], a lot of the bigger jobs are contracted out. We do a lot of or most of the trouble work. We also have a one-man crew concept that would have been unthinkable 30 years ago, but is now common practice. As far as a first responder, you get out to the job, maybe you can handle it if it is a blown fuse. Maybe you can open up some sectionalizing devices. You are not going to be doing any hands-on primary work, but the advantage is it is generally a lot quicker and cheaper to send one man than to send a three- or four-man crew.”

Among Machi's more memorable work experiences was restoration of power during and after a record ice storm in Quebec in 1998. “A normal ice storm might last four or five hours,” Machi recalls. “This one lasted for five or six days, and coated everything with up to 7 inches (178 mm) of ice. We were there four weeks, and there was not a pole standing for miles. There must have been 50,000 broken poles and 600 towers down.

“Edison sent 200 men up there, and that storm was quite the eye-opener,” Machi continues. “It was a lot of bull work in the worst conditions imaginable. We were there 28 days. It was incredible to put up that much wire in that amount of time. Linemen came in from all over the U.S. and from Canada. One kid even drove a flat-bed truck from Manitoba, two straight days of winter driving through terrible weather, just to get there and help out.”

Machi has seen utility companies themselves change over the decades. “Edison used to be strictly an electric utility; now they bought a gas company and they are into fuel-cell devices,” he notes. “They are making electricity from methane. So there are changes at the corporate or management level, but it never affects us. Line work is the same it always has been. In some cases, you do the work the same as you did 100 years ago. The biggest change is if you get in rough terrain now, you might have some heavy machinery or four or five men hauling a transformer up, instead of a horse.”

Machi's main concern regarding the future of line work is getting enough young, hardworking talent on board. “It is a tough life and the work is hard. And today's youth, they're not interested in that type of work, getting up at 2 o'clock in the morning and working in a 20 below wind chill,” he says.

But, he says those who can handle the demands of the job will find it one of the richest, most interesting and rewarding careers available.

“Well, you've got to be a little crazy,” Machi jokes. “There is an extremely diverse group of personalities that make up our group of overhead linemen here, and that makes going to work every day interesting. But it has to be more than just a job to you, because of the conditions you work under, the hazards and the physical toll it can take on you. If you are working on a storm, you might be 16 hours on and eight off, so it is hard, but you are working for the customer to get their power restored. There is an enormous amount of satisfaction when you come to work and a few hours later their lights are on. You cannot fake it. You have to know what you are doing. If you don't know what you are doing, everyone knows it. It is the greatest job in the world. Without us, everything goes dark.”