A man who signed up to work as a seasonal farm worker abroad suffered catastrophic injuries when his arm was pulled into a combine harvester on a rural New Zealand farm, the High Court has heard.
Padraig Lowry (29) told a judge the scene was “like something you could see in a horror movie” after his arm was amputated to four inches below his right elbow in the incident eight years ago.
Five hours after the incident, which saw him airlifted to hospital, the harvester was released to continue the work on the farm at Dipton, Southland, he said.
“There were bits of my skin and bones in the cylinder and they finished the job the next morning with my bodily parts still here, and all that went into a pit and was going to be fed to cattle,” he told Ms Justice Leonie Reynolds.
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The judge is assessing damages in the case where judgment has already been granted in default of appearance by the New Zealand side.
At the opening of the case, Richard Kean SC told the court the farm was far from any medical facility and Irish co-workers used their belts to tourniquet Mr Lowry’s injured arm as it pumped out blood.
Mr Kean, appearing with Liam Reidy SC and Martin Canny BL, said the judgment of the Irish High Court will have to be enforced in New Zealand, but the proceedings were brought here as the New Zealand company had come to Ireland and held meetings about travelling there for short-term work.
Mr Lowry told the court he met a representative of the New Zealand company in a Co Meath hotel and was offered a job that would start in October 2014.
He said that on the evening he was injured there was a blockage in the harvester chute at the last field. He said he pressed the button to switch off the machine but had to get a spanner.
He said there was a wind-down alarm and in no way would he have gone there if the alarm was showing, but the wind-down force means it will spin for 40 seconds and in his mind they were past 40 or 50 seconds and the alarm was not sounding. He said he gave a clump of oats a tug.
“It just went with my hand and there were four dull bangs. When I took my arm back all I could see was blood,” he said, adding that he turned around to his friends and saw his hand was gone.
Mr Lowry, of Cappalinnan, Rathdowney, Co Laois, has sued Daryl Thompson, of Invercargill, New Zealand and D.Thompson Contracting Ltd, also of Invercargill, New Zealand, as a result of the incident in January 2015.
It is claimed it was an express or implied term of the contract that Mr Lowry would be provided with a safe place of work, a safe system of work and safe equipment and machinery. It is claimed he was required to operate a machine that was dangerous and defective and the blades on the machine were permitted to be blunt, which allegedly resulted in the crop being cut too long and therefore blocking the chute.
It was also claimed the wind-down alarm on the machine was disconnected or not operating so as to warn Mr Lowry that the blades were still moving.
The case continues.