Employee killed in mower accident on golf course

[QueBota]

Golf course employee killed in Bell Township mower accident | TribLIVE

Lot's of questions here.

Dave

 

[JRobyn]

Mower was improperly attached ABOVE the drawbar/3-point and then the mower frame got hung on some immovable object while the pto and mower blades were still spinning?

Gruesome!

- Jay

 

[CliffordK]

Do the commercial golf course reel mowers have as good of guards as other types of mowers?

 

[Brad_Blazer]

If he fell off the moving tractor that type of mower would be hard to escape.
Hugghins Sod Farms, Inc - (800) ASK-4SOD

 

[Mace Canute]

Considering that Westmoreland County Detective Thomas Horan was quoted as saying “He was wound up into the tractor blades,” (my emphasis) I wouldn't put too much faith his actually being correct when he said " when something caused the tractor to tilt backward"...and that's with taking the article as being factually reported and posted without editing misconstruing anything. There's other more plausible reasons for him to have ended up in the blades of the mower. One possibility is he stopped, got off the tractor to check something and accidentally hit the gear shifter with his foot and knocked the tractor into gear.

 

[Scooby074]

Do the commercial golf course reel mowers have as good of guards as other types of mowers?

Not really. Unless they are a rotary. Most reels are unguarded.

 

[Arc weld]

Would be interested to know if it was pull type reels or a self propelled reel mower like a Jake F10/HF15 or Toro Parkmaster. A good reason to wear the seat belt. I know of an employee almost getting killed and trying to sue the golf course and Toro. He rolled a greens mower into a shallow creek. I believe the outcome was that it was operator error and not a problem with the mower. That said, I've cut greens built up on a hill with a narrow fringe. If it's wet, it's not uncommon to slide sideways on the side of the hill with the smooth tires.

 

[CliffordK]

Do the commercial golf course reel mowers have as good of guards as other types of mowers?

Not really. Unless they are a rotary. Most reels are unguarded.

That is what I thought.

I haven't ever been on a commercial mower, but this accident could likely have been prevented with better safety gear.

Hard to "fall out of" a cab.
If the average cut of a golf course reel mower is less than 1" or 2", perhaps even less, there is not reason not to have good guards on them, although it may add slightly more maintenance. Still, with guards, there is the risk of being run over by the mowers, but one would at least have a chance to push off of the guards.
If it is a Toro/Jacobson/etc, commercial mower, then one might expect at least the blades to stop instantaneously when weight is removed from the seat. One doesn't have to kill the engine, but no weight on the seat should put it into "park", and stop the mower from rotating.

 

[Arc weld]

There isn't enough information in the article to know what happened. A 7 gang would be used for fairways or the rough which would be taller grass. I don't believe there are any 7 gang mowers being built in the last 15 years at least, unless they are pull type. Most 7 gang are ground driven but a few like an HF15 are hydraulic driven and some are PTO driven from a tractor. Most were made before seat safety switches. 7 gangs aren't very common on golf courses anymore because they went to cross cutting fairways instead of just going up and down.