March 29, 2001
Ohio Farm Bureau's safety director knows about carelessness firt hand
By Erik Burriss
Staff Writer
Leroy Billman knows about carelessness. Eighteen years ago, it cost him his right arm.
He remembers Oct. 17, 1982 like people remember the Kennedy assassination, the Miracle on Ice, or the Challenger disaster.
"It was a nice day," he said. "It was warm. It was a real nice, fall day."
The 19-year-old Billman was running the round baler on his family's Delaware County farm. The first careless act was working alone on the farthest part of the farm from the house. The second was wearing an unbuttoned windbreaker. The third was not turning off the power when he went to check on a problem under the baler.
"The next thing I remember is laying there laughing, thinking I was dreaming," he said.
He realized his arm had been pulled into the baler, and tried to get away.
"I dug a hole about a foot deep with my feet," he said.
But it was no use. The baler continued to make a ruin of his head, arm and torso. Deciding he wanted a quick death, Billman tried to speed up the process by throwing himself into the baler's works. That was no use, either.
"So I decided to wait," he said.
Eventually, Billman's 13-year-old brother found him and called for help.
Taken by helicopter to Grant Hospital in Columbus, he ended up in a Louisville, Ky. hospital where he had to make the decision as to try to save his arm or not.
"I decided I didn't want the arm if it would be useless," he said.
So off it came. Two weeks later, he was able to go home, and today he is the Ohio Farm Bureau's safety director.
He told his story to almost 100 people at Wednesday's Rotary Club Rural-Urban Day annual lunch.
"We thought safety would be a good theme this year," said Clark Hutson, chairman of the event's organizational committee. "We've never done it before."
Giving his speech, Billman doesn't look any worse from his ordeal -- except for the missing arm, and the things that don't show, like the constant pain and an inability to sleep.
"That dumb thing I did will affect me the rest of my life," he said.
Farming is a dangerous occupation, he said. There are more than 100,000 agriculture-related injuries a year, many of them fatal. Only mining is more hazardous.
"Accidents happen all the time," he said. "But nobody else in the world needs to go through this kind of accident."
The key is prevention, and prevention means being careful. If only someone else had been closer. If only his jacket had not been hanging loose. If only he had turned off the baler.
"If you think you're taking a chance and 'this is stupid,' don't do it," he said. "There's your whole family out there. There's every one that loves you. They're victims, too."