Girl Dies When Power Line Falls On Her Antenna Her Brother Was Attaching To Roof Falls Onto Power Line, Which Snaps And Hits 16-Year-Old

A Spokane girl watching her brother attach an antenna to their home died Monday when the aerial hit a power line that snapped and fell on her.

Misty Schwehr’s heart wasn’t beating when emergency crews arrived at 11414 W. Indian Trail Road about 9:15 p.m., said Ron Bassen, a battalion chief for the Spokane Fire Department.

Efforts to help the 16-year-old Mead High School sophomore were hampered by the home’s isolation and the family telephone being knocked out by the accident.

The girl’s mother had to run nearly a quarter-mile to call for help.

Attempts to revive the girl at the house were unsuccessful, Bassen said Tuesday, and she was flown to Sacred Heart Medical Center by helicopter.

Sacred Heart doctors and nurses tried to resuscitate Schwehr until 11:04 p.m., when she was pronounced dead, a hospital spokesman said.

Schwehr’s family was too distraught Tuesday to talk about the accident or their daughter.

“It’s going to take a long, long time before they’re ready to talk about this,” a family friend said.

The tragedy illustrates the danger of power lines.

“Please, please tell people to stay clear of contact with overhead power lines,” said Jennifer Born of Washington Water Power Co. “The message we always try to give is ‘Look up and live.’ Unfortunately, that didn’t happen in this case.”

Bassen called the electrocution, which caused lights to flicker throughout the Indian Trail neighborhood, a freak accident.

Schwehr’s teenage brother was on the roof when he lost control of the antenna and it fell onto the nearby power line, Bassen said. He did not identify the brother.

The 25-foot aerial, meant to connect to a CB radio inside the house, caused a short in the line that melted it in two, the battalion chief said.

One end dropped onto the victim, who was watching on the ground.

The WWP spokeswoman said the 7,200-volt line served only the Schwehr residence.

The falling wire also shorted out the family’s telephone line, rendering its telephone useless, Bassen said.

The Schwehrs’ closest neighbors are nearly a quarter-mile away. “The mother had to run down the road for help,” Bassen said. “That made it even more traumatic.”

Emergency crews also had trouble finding the two-story house, which sits off by itself at the end of a nearly 200-yard driveway, Bassen said.

The girl’s mother was hysterical, he said, and the 911 dispatcher who took her call was unable to get good directions. “Our response time was just about eight minutes, which isn’t that good.”

When crews arrived, Bassen said, one end of the line still had electricity in it, and two relatives who didn’t know CPR were trying to revive Schwehr.

“The whole thing was pretty chaotic,” he said.

Funeral arrangements have not yet been made.

Teachers and staff members at Northwood Junior High School remembered Schwehr as a kind girl.

Schwehr attended Northwood between 1992 and 1995 before going to Mead this past fall.

Stan Peterson, a science teacher and softball coach at the school, said the girl used to tease him about his receding hairline.

“She was just always happy and bubbly,” Peterson said. “She was a great teaser. She kept me in stitches.”

Camille Murphy, secretary for the school’s counselors, said Schwehr “was always up” and had a maturity that not many junior high school kids have.

“None of us will forget her,” said Murphy, who was near tears. “Faces come and go here, but we’ll remember her. The child had a heart of gold.”

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