Window cleaner loses arm after 33,000-volt electric shock knocks him out of shoes in garden

A window cleaner miraculously survived a 33,000-volt electric shock that knocked him out of his shoes and left doctors with no choice but to amputate his arm after the deadly current jumped from an overhead cable on his cleaning pole in a customer’s garden.

Jason Knight, 34, from Westbury, Wiltshire, thought he was going to die after the powerful shock narrowly missed his heart and sent him flying seven feet onto a lawn in April this year, leaving burnt footprints in grass. The self-employed window cleaner was flown to Southmead Hospital where doctors carried out 17 surgeries to try to save him, but were forced to amputate his left arm and five of his toes which were severely damaged. burned.

Jason, who lives with his wife Sara, 35, and their 18-month-old identical twin daughters and seven-year-old daughter, remains in hospital where he faces months of recovery and has been told he will not be able to maybe never walk again. . His sister Leanna started a fundraiser on GoFundMe to help her young family and their recovery after Jason had to close his two-year-old cleaning business, H2O Vision.

LEARN MORE: Boy with little-known allergy has life-threatening reaction to hamburger despite parents’ repeated requests

“It was only when I looked at my feet, my shoes were no longer on, that I realized I had such serious injuries,” Jason told PA Real Life. “I somehow managed to roll and crawl to the nearest wall, closest to the veranda, and lean against it.”

“At that moment, all I thought was that I was going to die. I couldn’t tap on the window, I couldn’t do anything.” Jason’s father, John Knight, 58, added: “He should be dead.”

On April 6, Jason was using a water-powered pole to clean the windows of a customer’s conservatory whose electrical cables ran through the back garden. Neither the owner nor Jason knew that these were 33,000 volt power lines and that there were no obvious warning signs around the property.

He had finished cleaning the last window and was about to pack up when his carbon fiber pole approached one of the power lines and Jason was suddenly “catapulted” seven feet into the air.