Friday, March 5, 1999 | 11:53 a.m.
An electrician who fell to his death at the Venetian hotel-casino Thursday was the third worker who has died of injuries sustained at the construction site.
Earlier deaths included a construction worker hit by an iron-and-concrete slab last December and a steelworker who died in January 1998 of injuries sustained in a fall.
The construction site manager, Lehrer McGovern Bovis Inc., said a contract calling for financial penalties if the resort is finished late has not contributed to any unsafe conditions at the site.
Authorities said it may be weeks before they can determine what caused the electrician to fall 31 feet to his death at the Venetian on Thursday. Fred Joshongeva, 46, of Henderson had been on the second level testing electrical equipment for almost an hour when he plunged down an open ventilation duct 15 feet away about 7:30 a.m., said Robert McKissick, safety director for LMB.
Construction workers found the Tri-Power employee's body and called 911. Clark County Fire Department paramedics arrived and notified the coroner.
"There was no way we could have planned for something like this," McKissick said. "This was a freak accident."
Out of respect for Joshongeva, McKissick said, the workers decided on their own to shut down the site for the day.
The state's Occupational Safety and Health Administration launched an investigation Thursday, interviewing all employees on the job at the time of Joshongeva's death. McKissick said there could have been 20 to 200 people on the floor from which the electrician fell.
Although a barricade was initially reported to have been set up around the ventilation duct, McKissick said that the general area under construction had been blocked off and that workers were permitted to pass beyond the barricades to perform their tasks.
McKissick said Joshongeva was working in an area similar to "a back room or closet," out of sight of other workers. There were no witnesses to the accident.
The investigation into Joshongeva's death may last weeks, McKissick said, noting that a probe into 24-year-old Christopher S. Green's death Dec. 28 still hasn't concluded.
In that incident, a crane was moving a 10-by-20-foot fixture of concrete and iron facade into place at the top of the 35-story hotel's western tower when a cable connection either snapped or malfunctioned, dropping the five-ton slab onto Green, killing him instantly.
Jimmy Garrett, district manager for the state Occupational Safety & Health Enforcement Section, confirmed that the Green investigation hasn't been completed.
Garrett also confirmed that Anthony Releford, a 37-year-old ironworker, died in January 1998 after falling 32 feet off a rebar column. Releford was on life-support systems at a local hospital for several days before succumbing to his injuries.
In the Releford case, Garrett said, the state safety section imposed a fine of more than $60,000 on the construction manager, but the penalty was reduced to about $38,000 on appeal.
No fines or penalties have been proposed for the latest deaths because the investigations into their causes are still under way.
There also were reports that a fourth person had died at the site about four weeks ago after a fall, but Lehrer McGovern Bovis said the worker suffered a heart attack and is recovering after bypass surgery.
Sam Singer, a San Francisco-based crisis management specialist who has represented LMB in the past, said Thursday that the company was struggling to cope with the latest tragedy.
"We don't even know how he died," Singer said. "Any death is a sad and tragic event, but we need to hear more information from the coroner's office about the cause of death before we can comment."
Singer also said LMB's "guaranteed maximum price" contract to build the Venetian hasn't affected the company's emphasis on safety.
"LMB has an excellent safety record," Singer said. "We would never put a building ahead of any individual's life under any circumstances."
The $624 million contract calls for LMB to "substantially complete" the sprawling hotel-casino by April 13. If it doesn't and time rolls on, LMB and its parent company, British conglomerate Peninsular & Oriental Steam Navigation Co., may be liable for payments that could reach $300,000 a day.
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