Thursday, 4:30 PM
Police: two men electrocuted in Tyngsborough
By Michael Naughton, Globe Correspondent
Two middle-aged men were killed in Tyngsborough today when they snipped a wire on a transformer with bolt cutters and were electrocuted by 13,000 volts, police said.
The men were inside the fence around a high voltage area outside a vacant factory that once housed Hussey Plastic Manufacturers, according to Richard Burrows, the acting Tyngsborough police chief. It was not immediately clear why the men were there or what they were doing. There was no electrical work scheduled at the factory.
"They cut a line they thought was grounded, but it was live and had 13,000 volts going through it," Burrows said.
The men died at the scene. Police identified one man as Roland Farland, 58, of Nashua, NH. They were trying to identify the other man, who was not carrying identification. Burrows said he was in his 40s.
When the line was cut at about 3 p.m., it caused a power surge that triggered an alarm that notified the fire department. Firefighter found the bodies.
