I saw some workers on one of those "extreme careers" shows. The guys who work on the high tension lines don't even need to touch the lines to be electrocuted. They said that the power would arc from 14 inches and cause immediate death.
I used to be a TV tech and would have fun with coronas on the picture tube anode HV. 25,000 volts (old color TV) would jump a couple inches or so. Some of those tubes would charge up again of themselves after they had seemingly been grounded, I found that out the hard way.