# A wake up call for some



## carcajou (Jan 28, 2011)

The finest gentleman i ever had the pleasure of knowing was killed yesterday in a preventable tractor accident. He was moving a round bale and it come down over the loader arms. No ROPS. He left a wife and 6 children, and a crop to come off. A truly terrible loss for all who knew him. Enough said


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## RockmartGA (Jun 29, 2011)

So very sorry to hear about the loss of your friend. I'm sure each and every one of us on Haytalk has a story about a momentary lapse of judgement that could have ended in tragedy. Sometimes we have done a task a thousand times and become complacent. Timely message to keep your head in the game at all times.


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## hillside hay (Feb 4, 2013)

Sorry for your loss.


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## paoutdoorsman (Apr 23, 2016)

Such a sad situation. Sorry to hear about this carcajou.


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## Vol (Jul 5, 2009)

Sorry Ray. It hurts deeply to lose those you love.

Regards, Mike


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## swmnhay (Jun 13, 2008)

Sorry for your loss.

When round balers first became popular these kind of accidents happened much more frequent.


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## JD3430 (Jan 1, 2012)

Sorry to hear, Ray. My sympathies to you and his family.


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## haybaler101 (Nov 30, 2008)

So sorry to hear. My community has lost three farmers since the invention of the round baler, either to bale coming off loader on top of them or tractor roll over while carrying a bale.


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## IH 1586 (Oct 16, 2014)

Sorry for your loss.


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## somedevildawg (Jun 20, 2011)

That's tough, thanks for sharing Ray. Im sure farmers around the area gonna pitch in and get the crop, but who is gonna mentor the younguns.....sometimes it takes a village of help. Be careful guys and gals.....


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## Palmettokat (Jul 10, 2017)

Sorry for your loss and his family's loss. Think it was two years ago we had local farmer to have a round bale roll on him. Not sure the details but a young man was there who manager to get the roll off of him manually.

I have never moved a round bale but how does a rop save you from a bale coming off the fel? It seems it would still land on you but maybe it would push your upper body back between the up rights ups of the rop but still seems you would probably be pinned in the seat. Guess it depends on the setup of the tractor seating area.


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## Vol (Jul 5, 2009)

You know fellas, sometimes things just happen. I was mowing hay Thursday in one of my upland pastures and I was turning around at the end of a run. As I wheeled the 2wd tractor, the left front dropped into a hole unbeknownst to me that was about 2 foot in diameter and two foot deep. Thank God I was running low about 3-4mph. Anyway, it almost came to a dead stop and launched me into the roof of the cab. The ac and fan control knobs scalped me.  It hurt so bad it nauseated me.

If I would have been on a open station tractor it could have launched me over the front of it and then ran over me. After a few minutes I got off and looked the tractor over real close and was shocked there was nothing bent, nothing damaged. I finished mowing once I got my head to stop bleeding. You just cannot prepare for everything that can happen....and things do happen.

I think that it must be a small sink hole in that pasture that just popped open since I mowed last time. I will fill it with rock.

Regards, Mike


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## 8350HiTech (Jul 26, 2013)

Palmettokat said:


> Sorry for your loss and his family's loss. Think it was two years ago we had local farmer to have a round bale roll on him. Not sure the details but a young man was there who manager to get the roll off of him manually.
> 
> I have never moved a round bale but how does a rop save you from a bale coming off the fel? It seems it would still land on you but maybe it would push your upper body back between the up rights ups of the rop but still seems you would probably be pinned in the seat. Guess it depends on the setup of the tractor seating area.


This is true. A high back spear arrangement is probably a better preventative measure but having a ROPS on a loader tractor is very important too.


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## Palmettokat (Jul 10, 2017)

"Thank God I was running low about 3-4mph. Anyway, it almost came to a dead stop and launched me into the roof of the cab. The ac and fan control knobs scalped me.  It hurt so bad it nauseated me."

Mike glad it turned out good. I know wear seat belts on equipment is not fun but one think I need to get back use to. Have small excavator and use to never use it on slope without seat belt for same reason.

I have one tractor with FEL and two or three years ago replaced it with a self leveling loader. Not an expert with fel but soon learned the self leveling was a benefit when raising load as it helped prevent dumping it backwards on the tractor.


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## rjmoses (Apr 4, 2010)

Vol said:


> I think that it must be a small sink hole in that pasture that just popped open since I mowed last time. I will fill it with rock.
> 
> Regards, Mike


I have that happen frequently around me. 94 year old gentleman, who lives a ways up the road, was mowing a pasture a couple of weeks ago an dropped a wheel into a cattle run. Tipped the tractor over. He was bruised up but is OK.

That can happen SOOOOO fast hereabouts. 25-35 degree slopes (sometimes more) get a fellow into trouble read quick.

I have loaders on all my tractors and I run with the loader as low to the ground as possible. I keep one hand on the loader handle as much as possible and, if I feel things getting squirrelly, I drop the loader. The lower the center of gravity, the better.

Ralph


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## Hayjosh (Mar 24, 2016)

These things are very sad and tragic to hear. Like Vol said, sometimes things just happen. I can't fault the guy for anything, and I wasn't there to see it anyways. After all, he was working in one of the most dangerous professions. May the Good Lord bring comfort to his family and children who will be grieving for a very long time.


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## Gearclash (Nov 25, 2010)

I am sorry to hear of your loss carcajou. There have been two falling bale related deaths in this part of the world in the last two years, one a 10 year old boy, the other 70some year old truck driver. I knew the trucker personally, and I know the boys parents.


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## somedevildawg (Jun 20, 2011)

Wow, that's sad to hear that a 10 yr old was performing that task.....not a job for someone that age. That borders on neglect if he was directed to do so.....I see a lot of talk about young operators, at times it seems like a competition, how young can we go type of mentality. Some things they can handle, that is not one of them....very dangerous tasks.


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## thendrix (May 14, 2015)

Had a great uncle about 25 years ago that was killed in the same way. Moving rounds with forks instead of a spear. He was stacking in the barn on the top row when he started to spin and didn't take his hand off the lever and didn't level the forks. They got to the top and off it came. 5x6 on top of him. He was looking back and by all accounts never knew what hit him. I can't look at forks now without thinking of it. I guess the good that comes from it is I tell everybody I see using forks that story and have convinced a few to change


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## swmnhay (Jun 13, 2008)

thendrix said:


> Moving rounds with forks instead of a spear.


I'd be willing to bet this ^^^ is the reason for most deaths from round bales.


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## mlappin (Jun 25, 2009)

swmnhay said:


> I'd be willing to bet this ^^^ is the reason for most deaths from round bales.


A buddy was using the chain trick to feed cows rounds. He had a spear but it wasn't quick tach so he had to change buckets to use it, so log chain it was.

For those that never seen it if you have a hook on each end of a FEL bucket you hook a chain at each end and leave a long loop. drive up to the bale and lower the chain so its on the "front" of the bale, then you back up and lower the loader with the bucket in the full dump position, get behind the bale then curl the bucket back, this tightens the chain enough to pick the bale. He was watching the Jerseys more than the loader and when the loader was all the way up it "bounced" enough the bale went right over the back of the bucket and down the loader frame. Didn't kill him, but bent the steering wheel down into his lap, broke the seat, and a few other things on the dash. He was able to pull himself out from under it. Still has a seriously jacked up back from it and they added a rops to that tractor. Only spears are used to handle bales now and all loader tractors have either a ROPs or cab. He admits he was lucky that it was one of his bales and not mine, his are somewhat spongy and several hundred pounds lighter than mine.



8350HiTech said:


> This is true. A high back spear arrangement is probably a better preventative measure but having a ROPS on a loader tractor is very important too.


Same buddy has one of those, great for poking holes in the cover of a hoop building.


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## Gearclash (Nov 25, 2010)

somedevildawg said:


> Wow, that's sad to hear that a 10 yr old was performing that task.....not a job for someone that age. That borders on neglect if he was directed to do so.....I see a lot of talk about young operators, at times it seems like a competition, how young can we go type of mentality. Some things they can handle, that is not one of them....very dangerous tasks.





swmnhay said:


> I'd be willing to bet this ^^^ is the reason for most deaths from round bales.


Concur!! I see way too much of this. The 10 year old was opening gates for his 14 year old brother who was carrying a round bale with pallet forks on a skid steer. Skid steer bounced on frozen ruts and dislodged the bale, which the operator must have been carrying quite high, presumable so he could see under it. My understanding was this was not a normal practice for them to use pallet forks to move bales, but this one time they did and it cost them their son's life.


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## CowboyRam (Dec 13, 2015)

It is a crying shame when someone is killed because of a freak accident. I added onto a garage, and built a handicap ramp for a guy that had lost his legs because a tractor rolled on top of him. Unfortunately he did not get to enjoy that garage and ramp, he died shortly after. I don't know how they got along for all those years before we built that ramp.


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## Idaho Hay (Oct 14, 2016)

I'll be praying for his family. Not only are they having to morn his death, they'll have to make some major changes to their lives as they adjust to him not being there anymore.


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## Palmettokat (Jul 10, 2017)

It is sad anytime a person has an accident that leads to serious injury or death. It is good when others can learn from them. I had thought forks would be good to handle round bales with. Never entered my mind about the danger of a round bale coming off of forks. Not into round bales yet but was considering forks might work for them. Forget that.


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## thendrix (May 14, 2015)

No don't use forks. If you don't have a spear then find one, buy one, make one, or steal one. The last words my Pawpaw spoke to his brother was a bit of an argument about why he needed to be using a spear instead of forks


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## haybaler101 (Nov 30, 2008)

And don’t forget about big squares either. Do not handle them with forks, spears only. And if picking up more than one at a time, have the appropriate back stop. We would load 2 or 3 -3x3x8’s at a time and had spears with back stops to do it. Dad decided to help load the semi one morning and had a spear on his tractor without a back. Went to raise two bales up onto the neck of the trailer and the top bale came off backwards, down the loader arms, smashed the steering wheel in his lap and rolled off the side nearly smashing him. After I made sure he was ok, I probably used a few choice expletives and told him to not come back without a backstop.


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## endrow (Dec 15, 2011)

In this area since big 3 by 3 Square bales came in to play. Twice that I know of the Bales were stacked High the pile fell over and crushed the farmer. he was not on a tractor he was just standing there and it has happened twice


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## haybaler101 (Nov 30, 2008)

endrow said:


> In this area since big 3 by 3 Square bales came in to play. Twice that I know of the Bales were stacked High the pile fell over and crushed the farmer. he was not on a tractor he was just standing there and it has happened twice


3x3's are awful. Stack wants to fall over, not stable on truck, not safe to be around. I was stacking 4 high in barn and stack wanted to fall and my neighbor thought he could hold them up while I backed loader out. Good thing I saw the idiot, had a few choice words for him also.


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## JD3430 (Jan 1, 2012)

haybaler101 said:


> 3x3's are awful. Stack wants to fall over, not stable on truck, not safe to be around. I was stacking 4 high in barn and stack wanted to fall and my neighbor thought he could hold them up while I backed loader out. Good thing I saw the idiot, had a few choice words for him also.


Local guy was killed by 3x3's here a few yrs back.


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## CowboyRam (Dec 13, 2015)

haybaler101 said:


> 3x3's are awful. Stack wants to fall over, not stable on truck, not safe to be around. I was stacking 4 high in barn and stack wanted to fall and my neighbor thought he could hold them up while I backed loader out. Good thing I saw the idiot, had a few choice words for him also.


We had our neighbor bale some of our hay, and he as a 3x3. The first stack fell over right away, and we even had set a couple bales perpendicular to the stack.


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## woodland (May 23, 2016)

Neighbor had a hired hand put a bucket on a quick attach loader and forget to latch it on. After he raised the loader with the bucket rolled back it slid back on the loader arms but luckily fell off the side and took the door and fender off instead of joining him in the cab. Nothing is certain and it sure is sad when these things happen.

Our prayers go out to this family. Made me hug the kids a little more before bed tonight.


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## jr in va (Apr 15, 2015)

swmnhay said:


> I'd be willing to bet this ^^^ is the reason for most deaths from round bales.


Think I'll change over from my forks to stack this year with the spear,


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