On May 22, first responders with the Asbury Fire Protection District were awarded a grain rescue tube and were trained how to use it.

The donation is from the Nationwide insurance company through its Grain Bin Safety advocacy campaign. The training was provided by representatives of Specialty Risk Insurance.

Every year, thousands of farmers and commercial grain handlers risk their lives by entering grain bins to remove clumped or rotted grain.

“It only takes seconds, or a simple mistake, for an adult to sink in the quicksand-like flow of grain and become fully entrapped or engulfed,” according to Brad Liggett, president of agribusiness at Nationwide. “Adding to the risk is a lack of rescue equipment available to local fire departments and emergency responders who are called for help when a worker becomes trapped.”

Specialty Risk Insurance owner, Kevin Charleston, said, “We live in these farming communities receiving the rescue tubes and training. I see an increased risk year after year with the youth working on farms. They’re in their first job, not knowing the danger of climbing in a grain bin, and simply trying to be helpful. Our goal of grain bin safety sponsorship with Nationwide is to eventually have a grain bin rescue tube within 20 minutes of all the farms in the Carthage area in the worst-case scenario that someone is entrapped.”

The grain rescue tube delivery and training was conducted by the National Education Center for Agricultural Safety and included simulations of entrapments and rescues using a state-of-the-art grain entrapment simulator, which is loaded on a trailer and able to hold about 100 bushels of grain.

Asbury Fire Protection District is one of more than 270 fire departments to benefit from the Nationwide grain bin safety program since its inception. Since 2014, at least seven fire departments have put the tubes and training to use to save the lives of workers trapped in grain bins.