Texas Man Slips on TV Mast, Hangs on For 3 Hours

An East Texas man may embrace cable or satellite television after dangling head-down from a TV aerial mast for three hours.

Johnny Perry says he was working to dismantle a mast that had held a high aerial long used for rural television reception. The 53-year-old Bullard man tells the Jacksonville Daily Progress his trouble started when his foot slipped, his safety belt slipped around his legs and he dangled upside-down.

Earls Chapel Fire Chief Ted Hunt says his crews and some from nearby Jacksonville and Rusk worked for hours to pull his head up so that the tension on his lines could be eased and the ropes cut.

Perry was checked out and discharged from Trinity Mother Francis Hospital in Jacksonville, about 105 miles southeast of Dallas.