OTHELLO, Wash. - A 50-year-old utility worker plunged to his death in front of hundreds of students who were outside their school for a science demonstration.

The accident happened outside Hiawatha Elementary School in Othello, Washington where students were dropping eggs from up high.

Students watched as the utility worker, Bob Smith, and a teacher were hoisted 30 feet in the air in a bucket supported by a long boom.

The bucket somehow fell and both Smith and the teacher crashed to the ground. Smith died and the teacher survived with unknown injuries.

"Some of the kids started crying, we were all shaking, we just didn't know what to do," said Karen Magana, a 6th grader at the school.

Magana and her friends were shaken up by what they saw. They're finding comfort being with each other.

"It made a sound, crack and then it fell," Magana said.

"I started crying, it was really sad," said Ana Ramirez, a 5th grader at the school.

Ramirez's teacher was in the accident. She and her classmates cannot believe what happened.

"The moment it happened, it was so quick, the thing started dropping and they both fell to the ground and the ambulance came and everything," Magana said.

"When we were crying, we were telling each other they'll be fine and we were comforting each other," student Karina Garcia said.

The scene of the accident was taped off and investigators were trying to figure out how the boom separated from its base and fell.