A Sturgeon County farmer is recovering in hospital after spending 20 hours trapped inside a combine.
Ray Como, 82, fell into the engine compartment of the machine around 1 p.m. last Friday and was not discovered until almost 9:30 a.m. on Saturday morning.
After his son-in-law found him trapped in the machine, he called 911. It took firefighters another hour to free him.
Morinville fire department Capt. Herb Pearce said when firefighters first received the call, they thought it was a much different situation and were stunned with what they encountered.
“We were expecting to get out there to someone sitting behind the wheel of a combine, but when we got out there it was a bit of a different story.”
Pearce said Como appears to have fallen into the engine compartment of the large machine while working on it.
“He fell into a cavity about three and a half to four feet deep sort of in a head-first mode and became very entangled, so the extraction took quite a while to get the fellow out.”
Pearce said taking apart the machine to free Como took a long time and most of the department’s tools.
“It took close to half-an-hour to just get his upper torso free and get him upright and then his legs and feet were also pretty entangled.”
He said the department has experience freeing people from plane crashes and farm equipment, as well as hundreds of car crashes, but this one was definitely unique.
“It was a little bit different. You were about 14 feet on top of the combine there.”
He said inside Como was tilted on about a 45-degree angle, not quite upside down, but enough that his legs were well above his head.
When he was finally freed form the machine, Como was taken by STARS to an Edmonton hospital. Pearce said considering what he endured, he was in remarkably good shape.
“I can’t imagine the gentleman being trapped there for 20 or 21 hours.”
Como was suffering from hypothermia and was bruised from the fall. He also had some problems stemming from blood sitting in one place for an extensive period of time.
