Post Hole Digger Death

[GYPSY]

not to takeaway from the post, but a fella a few years back my way got caught up in the pto shaft of his rotary cutter. whatever the heck happened, he got off with the pto engaged and some part of his clothing got caught up in the shaft and wrapped him silly around it causing a horrible death. man, gotta be careful around power equipment of any kind let alone one that have serious hp.

 

[jwmorris]

I think I was 11 when my Grandfather told me a story about a boy he knew when he was young getting the cuf of his overalls caught on a bolt holding a coupler to a PTO shaft. It didn't kill him but took all the skin from the family jewels and inner leg and stripped it down to the ankle in the process of breaking all of the leg bones.

To this day I am never around an operating PTO shaft that I don't think of that story.

 

[buickanddeere]

Too many people want to "get er done" as quick as possible with a minimal investment of cash.

 

[TomSeller]

Too many people want to "get er done" as quick as possible with a minimal investment of cash.

Right, or without shutting down for a moment for safety. In this case she was likely trying to guide the head or put down pressure on it, but certainly there could have been a safer way.

 

[Renze]

I saw a guy posting pictures on another site, of a potato digger with a photo of where he was caught. (no photos of the actual event) he got out lucky, tried to kick a foil plug out of the separator. If you do it with running machine you can just push the plug through it, if you shut it down you have to pull it ALL out by hand.

I asked him about next time... he said next time he'd shut the machine down... I said how long before you do it again in a hurry ? because it WILL happen again when the skies turn dark and the work must continue... you better carry a wooden stick to poke in the foil rollers, so you can stand at safe distance and all it can do is pull the stick out of your hands... He thought that was a good idea.

Its just human nature to ignore safety when you're in a hurry... You can tell yourself a thousand times you'll keep clear of a running machine, but when getting frustrated you WILL do something stupid, so you better take a stick so you dont have to use your limbs.

 

[Eyecatcher]

When I was 10 yrs old, we had an old 10-20 belted up to a feed grinder, grinding corn to feed the cows. Something jammed up, and dad jumped the belt to kill the tractor before everything broke. Caught his toe under the belt, and it flipped him head over heels, and he came down on his head. Was laid up all winter, and two years later was diagnosed with brain cancer, which ultimately took his life. When he was a young man, he had been kicked in the head by a mule, and had never suffered any consequences from it. The doctors said that a small tumor had formed from the kick, and some 30 years later, the belt accident had aggravated that dormant growth, and resulted in the cancer. As I recall the grinder cleared itself, and went humming along until I was able to shut down the tractor. That was 65 years ago, and I can still see him tumbling through the air.

 

[ishiboo]

Very sad.

When I bought my CountyLine (Speco) I noticed they even removed the long-handled guide from the back. For liability reasons they don't even want someone holding on to a five foot pole attached to the thing.

Did my fence and the old farmer I had working for me wanted to guide it down each time… had to keep telling him his services went only as far as locating the hole and then it was time to move away!