Adéodat Lalonde was severely injured on 1 November 1978 when he saved his son from death by electrocution. The seventeen-year-old had been pruning a tall fir-tree when one of the branches fell on to power lines. As he tried to disentangle it, an electric charge locked his grip. Seeing this, Mr. Lalonde climbed his son's ladder and grasped him by the trousers. The current then passed through them both, and they fell to the ground. The son was treated for burns, and Mr. Lalonde had a leg amputated above the knee.