Description
Install, maintain, and repair overhead and underground electric power lines and related equipment. Climb poles or use bucket trucks, perform switching and grounding, and respond to outages to restore service safely and efficiently.
- • Follow OSHA/NESC safety practices; inspect gear; set up traffic control and barriers.
- • Perform switching and apply grounds to de-energize lines or make downed lines safe.
- • Climb poles, towers, and use bucket trucks to access lines and equipment.
- • Install protective cover-up, insulating blankets, and guards on energized conductors.
- • Install, maintain, and repair overhead/underground distribution and transmission lines, transformers, regulators, reclosers, breakers, and switches.
- • Troubleshoot and identify defects in fuses, reclosers, regulators, transformers, switches, and wiring using diagrams and test instruments.
- • Drive and operate line trucks and equipment to job sites.
- • Coordinate jobs with crew members, dispatch, and system operators.
- • Inspect and test lines and equipment to locate faults using meters, phasing sticks, and other testers.
- • String, sag, and tension conductors and fiber using blocks, winches, and dynamometers.
- • Identify and phase conductors per diagrams and specifications to prevent cross-connection.
- • Replace, straighten, and guy damaged or leaning poles.
- • Install meters and connect or disconnect overhead and underground service drops.
- • Install crossarms, insulators, hardware, and attachments on poles and structures.
- • Patrol lines by truck, foot, or air to check clearances, obstructions, and condition.
- • Dig holes with digger derricks and set poles with cranes and rigging.
- • Trim vegetation to maintain right-of-way clearances around lines.
- • Splice overhead and underground conductors and cables using compression, heat-shrink, epoxy, or solder.
- • Prepare cables by removing sheathing and insulation to make splices or terminations.
- • Clean, tin, and join conductors with clamps, crimps, or solder as specified.
- • Pull cable from reels and feed through blocks, duct, or conduit.
- • Lay and rack underground cable in trenches, manholes, and conduits.
- • Excavate and backfill trenches using trenchers and cable plows.
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O*NET occupational data (work activities, skills, knowledge).
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This site includes information from O*NET by the U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration (USDOL/ETA), used under the CC BY 4.0 license. Career Clutch has modified some of this information for student readability. USDOL/ETA has not approved, endorsed, or tested these modifications. O*NET® is a trademark of USDOL/ETA.
Last reviewed: Jan 2026
