We have been following disturbing incidents regarding the nation’s food processing facilities and farms in the past several months.
There is now another incident to add to this list.
Approximately 18,000 cows were killed, and one person was critically injured, in an explosion at a dairy farm in the Texas Panhandle on Monday.The Castro County Sheriff’s Office confirmed with Fox News Digital that the cows were in a holding area before being brought in for milking when the blast occurred at the Southfork Dairy Farm in Dimmitt.Very few cows in the holding area survived, officials told local outlet KFDA.”Your count probably is close to that. There’s some that survived, there’s some that are probably injured to the point where they’ll have to be destroyed,” Castro County Sherif Sal Rivera told KFDA.
The scale of this fire is historic.
According to the Animal Welfare Institute, this fire is by far the deadliest barn fire for cattle overall and the most devastating barn fire in Texas since they began tracking barn fires in 2013.The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality Amarillo Region arrived on scene at around 9:30 a.m. on Tuesday and are assisting the dairy owner with carcass disposal/debris issues.Nearly 6.5 million farm animals have perished in barn fires since 2013, according to an AWI analysis.NewsChannel 10 has reached out to the Texas Commission of Environmental Quality.They have a crew on the scene that is assessing the damage.
The cause of the fire is being investigated. Overheated electrical equipment is suspected as the cause of the blaze, which ignited the methane-rich cow waste.
The cause of the fire has not yet been confirmed, though Castro County Sheriff Sal Rivera told KCBD on Tuesday that early speculation is that methane may have been ignited by overheating electrical equipment used to suck out waste from the holding pens.The state fire marshal is investigating the cause of the fire.
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