There was a great buzz around our farm in 2009 when we were building a new 12-unit milking parlour. Our herd of 60 cows had definitely outgrown the old five-unit parlour which Dad built himself 30 years previous.

We painted half the parlour walls one evening with special blue paint that would make them easier to hose down after milking. The next morning Dad went back to finish the job on his own, but the paint can was left open overnight, the paint had hardened and was unusable. Not having planned any other jobs, Dad was at a loss as to what work to do instead.

He decided to fix a crack in the PVC ceiling of the new dairy. When installing augers for the parlour feeders overhead the roof of the dairy, one fitter stepped on the PVC ceiling and cracked it. Dad decided he would cut out this crack and nail up a square replacement piece – a simple job.

Angle grinder

He set up make shift scaffolding with two builders H frames and a pallet. He was standing on this, while using an angle grinder above his head, to cut out the broken PVC piece. As Dad began to cut the PVC the scaffolding gave way and he went hurtling to the ground.

As he fell he had to throw the angle grinder away to prevent the spinning disc cutting him. He managed this just before he hit the floor, dislocating his shoulder and bruising his ribs.

It’s amazing how a sequence of insignificant events can lead to a farm accident – the fitter stepping on the PVC ceiling, the lid being left off the paint can, completing a job you hadn’t properly planned for.

Lessons learned

I guess the moral of the story is to properly think out and plan any work on the farm and always think about safety. The dislocated shoulder was a real pain for Dad over the next three months. As cows calved, he could only watch us milk them in the new parlour, but he considered himself lucky to be alive to do so.