Farm Machinery and Left-Hand Turns Fatality File

Death on the Farm

Agricultural jobs are the most dangerous in the world. Why aren’t we talking about it?

Tim Smith has a story to tell, but it’s stuck way down in his throat. Typically, this fourth-generation Iowa farmer is chatty and warm, but sitting at the kitchen table with his wife, Tina, his face is ashen, his eyes clouded. Smith starts talking a few times, only to trail off mid-sentence.

Twenty-six years ago, a farm accident nearly took Smith’s life. His jeans caught on a piece of manure-pumping equipment, and, in the blink of an eye, his leg was connected to his torso by a mere inch of flesh. Smith, who farms in Clay County, Iowa, had to be flown to a hospital in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. Doctors told him he was lucky to survive with his leg intact. And in the decades since, the memory hasn’t faded a bit. “I came very close,” Smith whispers.