Our response to a serious incident
We recently experienced a serious incident in the field involving one of our drivers, Gareth.
The incident occurred on a Friday evening at 10:30pm, when we were moving fields down a farm track, with all three harvesters in a row with plenty of room between them. Gareth, who was driving the harvester in the middle, suffered a seizure, causing him to push the forward control fully forward and accelerate the machine.
The other drivers noticed this on their cameras and attempted to call him up, but his machine ran into and glanced off the viner in front of him, which steered him into a field of oilseed rape. Luckily, the harvesters do not run at a very high speed - a maximum of around 18mph - but the machine crossed the field and ran into a dyke, where it stopped.
It was a frightening experience for the other drivers but they immediately called the emergency services and stayed with Gareth, making sure that he didn’t swallow his tongue, until help could arrive. The response of the emergency services was fantastic as they soon arrived on site, including the ambicopter, ensured Gareth was in a stable condition, and transported him to Lincoln County Hospital.
Gareth was released just 24 hours later, but we were conscious of the psychological and mental impact this could have on the other drivers as well. We took some time away and offered them the opportunity to go home, but they decided to continue harvesting at a steady pace to keep things ticking over.
We continued to talk about the incident while checking in on Gareth on a regular basis to make sure he was ok. Unfortunately, he wasn't able to come back to drive for us, but we made sure that he felt part of everything for the rest of the year as well as supporting his well-being as much as possible.
The damage to the harvester was significant - the total bill came to over £100,000. But with the backing and support of the rest of the UK pea industry, we had the machine up and running by Sunday morning, which was an incredible feat.
It was an awful incident that nobody would want to be repeated, but it was a brilliant effort by all concerned, showing what can be achieved when everyone comes together in a crisis.
