Shirley Morrish
On behalf of the Rainy River Rural Safety Association, I would like to remind everyone that this is Farm Safety Week (March 14-20).
Safety is for all of us.
The baseline in safety is attitude. There is no single cause for accidents—and no single cure.
The list of dangers is long and complex. Many have said: “I won’t happen to me,” “Safety is for sissies,” and “When it’s my time, that’s it.”
The “sympathy” aspect of an injury or fatality only lasts for a little while. Unless the tragedy hits close to home, we soon forget.
But there are far too many excuses given for not working safely.
In order for an accident to take place, there has to be a hazard. Is that hazard you?
Every day you have freedom of choice. You can choose to work safely or not, but you must be prepared to live with the consequences.
As our recent farm safety meeting, Stefan Szeder and Len Kuorikoski spoke about their personal workplace accidents that happened in 2009.
Both were lucky. Both realize that accidents are preventable. Both lived to tell us that it’s important to be educated on safety.
Accidents are happening in every age group, in every occupation, in every recreational activity, in our every-day living. The statistics are staggering, and it is difficult to measure the success of any safety program.
We have many dedicated volunteers who are trying to make our farms a safer place to live and work. We have a tremendous amount of information on every aspect of farm safety.
Farming is a great life. Let’s keep safe and keep alive to enjoy that life!
For more information, call our president, Rick Neilson, at 487-2387.
Let’s fact it, it doesn’t matter how much land you own, how many top-producing cows you have, or how big your tractor is. If you’re not there, who will be?
Safety is up to us all!
