When the milked cows leave the parlor they exit down a return alley. Our set up was re-worked many years ago, so the return alleys will accommodate a cow and that's about it.
For the most part a cow will move in whatever direction you direct them without much effort. They are pretty docile. One of our workers was in the return alley. This time, this cow, which was a bit larger than most, had made up her mind she was going straight ahead and not going to back up. Our worker got the worst of her decision.
He was wedged between the cow and a guard rail and was rolled around and around until the length of the cow passed him. Remember this animal is around 1600 pounds.
He made it into the back room where he phoned for help.
We received the call a little before 6:00AM. After jumping up out of bed and throwing on some clothes, praying while doing so, I went down the hall and into the office where Farmer was phoning the ambulance. "Just head to the barn" he waved me off.
Well, I had no clue what the problem was or what I was going to find. I didn't know at the time the cow had rolled him. I was thinking “Is he hurt from a piece of machinery? Is he mangled? Is he bleeding?”
That was when I had an adrenaline dump. My arms and legs felt like 600 pounds each. I forced my limbs to work to get to the car.
In the car, I phoned Son #2 and told him I needed him to come with me and what I knew about the situation.
I swung by his house and picked him up on the way down to the parlor. The parlor was our first stop in the attempt to find him. Mind you, we didn't know anything - where he was, how he was hurt or anything. Part of me is thinking "what can I possibly do to help?"
When we rounded the corner of the barn and into the parlor area we saw him standing outside with another worker. Relief flooded me like the Niagara Falls.
We soon realized he was hurt pretty bad, but it didn't seem life threatening. Within ten minutes the ambulance was there and the First Response Team from our township started arriving minutes before the ambulance.
He is in the hospital with six broken ribs in the front and back of one side, two broken ribs on the other side, a lacerated spleen and some issue with one of his lungs. They did X-rays of his shoulder too, but I haven't heard that there is anything with that. He is in a lot of pain and will be down and out for months.
Farming is listed in the top five most dangerous jobs in America. We personally know of deaths from PTOs, gases from manure storage, animal related and other ways. Yet, everyday my Farmer, Sons and employees face it head on. Perhaps our milk check should have an add on for hazard pay.
Going through this incident causes you to stop and ponder a bit. We do have to be careful and mindful. I've written twice about close calls on the roads mostly because of impatient or ignorant drivers that don't think they should have to share the roads with us. There are not many things we do on a daily basis that doesn't have the potential for injury. Yet, this is only the second time we had to call an ambulance. That, right there shows me we are living under God's protection.
Because of our worker's injury the value of our milk has just went up quite a bit.
