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2 trapped in car by live wire rescued

No one was injured after a power line fell on a vehicle Tuesday morning along Route 248 in Franklin Township.

Township police Chief Jason Doll said the incident occurred just before 10 a.m. in the area of Lehigh Gastroenterology Associates LLC.

Doll said vehicles were traveling eastbound on Route 248 when a female driver that got struck by the line called and reported she had seen something flash and a wire hit her vehicle while she was inside with a passenger.

He said the Communications Center told the woman to stay in the vehicle so that they wouldn’t get electrocuted, and added that both individuals were stuck in the vehicle for nearly an hour.

Doll said a Corvette in front of that vehicle also hit the line.

“It may have just snapped randomly at the pole and fell into traffic,” Doll said.

Doll said the Corvette had some burns on the hood of his car from the line, as it went over his vehicle and wound up hitting the vehicle driven by the female driver who got struck by the line.

He said police initially cleared the scene at around 11:15 a.m., but that they had to come back around 12:30 p.m. to shut down the street so PPL could pull a fresh line across. It was closed a second time for about a half hour.

The outage that occurred around 9:30 a.m. along Route 248 impacted a total of 776 customers, according to Jane George, Regional Affairs director, PPL.

“PPL Electric Utilities crews quickly responded to the scene and encountered a downed wire on a vehicle,” George said. “Working with the local fire department, the PPL Electric crew was able to safely remove the wire from the vehicle.”

George said service was restored to all customers impacted by the outage around 1:15 p.m.

PPL Utilities and Franklin Township police on the scene where people were trapped in a car by a fallen wire. COPYRIGHT LARRY NEFF/SPECIAL TO THE TIMES NEWS
A PPL lineman goes up in a bucket to clear the wire that fell on a car.
Traffic is backed up on Route 248 while PPL removes the power lines. Route 248 was closed in both directions. COPYRIGHT LARRY NEFF/SPECIAL TO THE TIMES NEWS
People were trapped in a car on Route 248. COPYRIGHT LARRY NEFF/SPECIAL TO THE TIMES NEWS