In Abbatiello v. Lancaster Studio Associates, 3 NY3d 46 [C.A.2004]) plaintiff, a cable repair technician, was dispatched by his employer to an apartment building owned by Lancaster Studio Associates in response to a complaint by one of the building's tenants. In the course of accessing a junction box on the exterior of the building, plaintiff's ladder bent, causing him to fall and sustain injuries. In holding that the plaintiff was engaged in "routine maintenance," the Court of Appeals stated, plaintiff determined that the cause of the defective signal was water in the tap, a common problem caused by rainwater accumulating in junction boxes affixed to building exteriors. The remedy would have been to loosen a few screws and drain the water from the tap and, if work out, replace the tap. These activities constitute routine maintenance and not repair as contemplated by Labor Law 240(1). (Abbatiello v. Lancaster Studio Assocs., supra at 53). In the course of accessing a junction box on the exterior of the building, plaintiff's ladder bent, causing him to fall and sustain injuries. As a result, he commenced an action against Lancaster alleging a violation of Labor Law 240 (1). Although the Court observed that Lancaster was unaware of and did not consent to the plaintiff's presence on the property, these facts alone were not determinative of our affirmance of the dismissal of the complaint. In Abbatiello v. Lancaster Studio Associates, 3 NY3d 46, 51 [2004] the owner was wholly unaware that the injured plaintiff, a cable television technician dispatched to the property in response to a complaint of a tenant cable subscriber, was working on the property. In that case, the Court made clear that, although the purpose of Labor Law 240 (1) is to place the ultimate responsibility for safety practices on owners and contractors, rather than on the workers themselves, an owner "cannot be charged with the duty of providing the safe working conditions contemplated by Labor Law 240 (1) for workers of whom it is wholly unaware" (id. at 52.)