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Safety fi rst
Page 28 • Country Acres | Friday, October 15, 2021Safety fi rst
Tschida is testament that farm accidents can happen to anybody
BY NATASHA BARBER | STAFF WRITER
PHOTO BY NATASHA BARBER Don and Mary Tschida stand on their thirdgeneration farmstead Sept. 15 in rural Pierz. Together, the Tschidas survived a farm accident in July 2018 that involved Don being run over by a tractor and attached round baler.
PIERZ – “I wonder what God has in mind for you.”
From a dream state, Don Tschida remembers his brother, Paul, uttering these words by his hospital bedside in early August 2018.
And while Don may not know the path God intends for him, he knows one thing for sure: He is lucky to be alive.
“I’m very, very fortunate,” Don said. “There are so many farm accidents that don’t turn out this way. We are blessed that we survived this.”
Farm accidents account for 30% of work-related deaths in Minnesota each year, and the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reports the agricultural sector remains the most dangerous in America with 573 fatalities in 2019. Don survived what he now deems as a preventable accident. In sharing his story, he hopes to forewarn others to slow down and make safety a priority when working on the farm. “I was just in too big of a hurry,” Don said. “It was an accident, obviously, but there is guilt.”
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The early evening hours at the Tschida farm July 31, 2018, parallel settings found on farmsteads across the country. Don’s wife, Mary, was inside the couple’s white e farmhouse fi xing supper er while Don tended to the he fi elds on their third-genneration property in rural al Pierz.
“We were harvesting g oats right in this fi eld and d had just fi nished combining,” said Don as he sat at his dining room table Sept. 15, gesturing to a fi eld north of his home just beyond a tree line. “I cleaned the combine off and evening was approaching. I wanted to rake the outside rounds as Mary’s brother was coming to bale straw the next day. It’s just a lot easier if those outside rounds are done.”
Don prepared for the next day, driving to the fi eld a 90-horsepower John Deere 4040 tractor with an attached round baler. He raked the edges of the fi eld using other
- Don Tschida
equipment before coming back to the tractor and baler shortly after 7 p.m. This time, the tractor wouldn’t start.
“We had been having trouble with that tractor since spring,” Don said. “I had to turn the key multiple times before it fi nally would start.”
Repeated attempts were ineffective. So, in an effort to beat the sunset, Don decided to jumpstart the equipment. He retrieved his pickup and hooked up cables with no result.
“I knew if I put the cables on the ground (negative) and touched the starter bolt, it would work; that’s what I did,” he said.
The engine fi red and Tschida began to remove the clamps, but he quickly realized something was wrong.
“I felt something on my leg. I looked down and the wheel was rolling up my leg,” Don said. “I tried getting my leg out and I couldn’t. I remember telling myself to get as much out of the way as I could. I don’t remember a lot after that.”
As the tractor, and then baler, ran over the th left side of his body, Don le was snagged underneath w and dragged about 20 an yards before he was rey leased. The tractor conle tinued its path another 60 ti yards before stopping in y the nearby tree line. t
Alone, in a fi eld, and in and out of consciousi ness, what happened next n can only be explained as ca a miracle, according to a Don and Mary. D
“My phone is always in the tractor – always,” in Don said. “When I’m D running those tractors, ru the ash tray is there and th it’s a smaller phone, so it it it fi ts right there. … It’s either in the tractor or in my left pocket and that’s what got ran over. It should have been crushed if it was in there.”
Yet, when he needed it most, Don’s phone was there, laying on the ground next to him. Unable to move or yell, Don was able to call 911. He asked for dispatch to call his son, Calvin – a Pierz police offi cer and fi rst responder who lives nearby his parents’ property. When Don hung up, he called
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