Fatality involving tractor

After reading post below about tractor upset, I felt I should report on a fatality that occurred three weeks ago less than a mile from here. A 67 year old man was using a tractor equipped with front end loader. He was using tractor/loader to push against a standing tree. Tree failed to go forward as intended but instead came back onto tractor. Man was pinned in the tractor seat and he died there. I do not know the size of the tree or if the tree had been partially cut with chainsaw or not. Local mail carrier told me that the man had diabetes and had had a leg amputated at some time. I do not know if he had a prosthesis or not. I did not know the man.

In a separate incident that happened a few miles from here recently, a man just barely escaped injury while using the tractor seen in the attached picture. I am acquainted with the man who was operating the tractor. He is probably early to mid seventies in age. I was told that he said that tractor front end got light as he started upgrade pulling large rotary mower. He pushed in clutch to stop, his foot slipped off the clutch pedal and the front end came up. For some reason the tractor stopped in the position seen in picture. Needless to say, a VERY CLOSE call.

Since I have gotten older I am doing thing differently than I used too, trying to be safer. I try to use tractors larger than needed for the job. I have ROPS on the loader tractors. I have the tires set out wider with front and rear weights, on any tractors I take on steeper ground.

I am more clumsy, my reactions are slower, and my sense of balance is not as good as it used to be so I need to understand these limitations an do things to try and balance my short comings out.

Amazing that the Massey didn't finish its maneuver. Your acquaintance is one very lucky fellow!

That was close. Sad some dont survive. Its like anything else danger awaits up around the bend.everybody please be careful

i'd say the massy has a rops, it's to far over center to not have...

JD,
I learned the hard way ROP on a loader doesn't do any good if you don't use the seat belt. I was pushing on a tree this spring while another man was running the chainsaw. We wanted the tree it to fall a different direction. In a heart beat I was thrown off the seat, landed on the ground. Only God knows why the tractor didn't come all the way over me. I pinched a nerve in back and hip.

Big lesson learned. Don't push on a tree with loader. After that we tied 100 ft of chain to tree and pulled the tree so it would go the direction we wanted.

I too think the older I get the more I need new spark plugs in my brain. Not firing on all cylinders.

jd were in the same boat. I stress safety to m self all the time as my age is catching up to me. just cant stress it enough. sounds like a man that wasn't going to let his health keep him from doing what he wanted to do. good for him. just sad it cost him his life.

Please tell me you weren't using your "Tonka"mite on an actual tree.

I am finding at 50 that I am not as sharp on certain things, there is a time to do less dangerous work.

At 60

If that tractor had a ROPS that PTO shaft would have been bent. That is quit a hill that he was mowing up and down.-----------Loren

I know a man who was dragging a log and stood a Massey on end like that. The way I understood his story, it sounded like the front end got high enough that the seat flipped up and dumped him on the ground behind the tractor. I don't know if the seat raises up on those Masseys, so I may have misunderstood him, but he said he was lying on the ground thinking that he was going to get crushed. The tractor stood there balanced on the raised three point drawbar and the rear tires. He has pictures of it before he pulled it back down on its wheels. Spooky pictures. He firmly believes that his then recently deceased mother was his guardian angel in the incident.

(quoted from post at 07:03:08 09/05/19) If that tractor had a ROPS that PTO shaft would have been bent. That is quit a hill that he was mowing up and down.-----------Loren

Click to expand...

Acg, that pto that you see is the one that goes back to the wing.

I would guess the pto hooked to the tractor wedges and held it from going completely over. Very very lucky

Seems to me that that particular tractor has no business mowing a hill like that, especially up and down.