A St. Joseph County (Ind.) farmer working with his son and nephew was killed when an article of clothing he was wearing got caught in a power take off shaft.
Gary Schmeltz, 60, was outside a barn on his family's dairy farm at 13099 Osborne Rd. outside Wakarusa when he died about 11:30 a.m. Sunday.
According to St. Joseph County Police, Schmeltz was next to a barn using the PTO shaft to power a conveyor system for moving corn or some other farm product from a wagon into a silo.
Apparently, he was too close to the shaft when one of the sleeves on his coveralls got caught in the fast spinning shaft.
St. Joseph County Police Chief Bill Thompson said he's investigated a number of similar deaths in his 28-year law enforcement career. People who get an article of thick, heavy clothing caught in a shaft die within seconds.
He said the machine was turned off by one of the family members fairly quickly, but the shaft turns so quickly with such torque that getting caught up in one almost instantly results in death.
"It's gruesome and happens in what seems like the blink of an eye,'' Thompson said.
Thompson said PTO shafts nowadays come with a protective shield to prevent such tragic accidents from occurring.
The shaft used by Schmeltz, though, was an older model that did not have such protection, he said.
According to his obituary, Gary was a 4-H Leader for Madison Twp. for over 10 years and was currently president of the St. Joseph County Dairy Assn.
Schmeltz was also co-owner with Gary Grubbs of the Maier Pheasant Farm, a rustic 240-acre hunting preserve at 65450 Fir Rd. in Bremen.
Grubbs, 57, said he and Schmeltz began operating the hunting preserve in 1987 and in 2006 they acquired it.
They had known each other from childhood, with both graduating from Penn High School in Mishawaka.
"If I were to pick anybody for a brother, it would be him,'' said Grubbs, who looked up to Schmeltz not just for the good advice he offered him at times, but for carefully thinking things through before making decisions.
As an example of them sticking together through both the good times and the bad times, he recalled how both of them built a lodge to replace a barn that burned down in 2012 at the hunting preserve and how they cut down trees and took them to a sawmill for getting the lumber to do it.
He said Schmeltz hardly ever got angry, but if he had something to say "he'd state it clearly and that would be the end of it.''
"He was one of the most honest people you will ever meet," Grubbs said.
Schmeltz leaves behind his wife, Wanda, and their two grown children, Adam and Olivia.
He operated a near 100- head dairy farm still owned by his father.
According to his obituary, Schmeltz attended River Valley Church in Mishawaka.
Visitation will be 2-4 and 6-8 p.m. Thursday and one hour prior to the 11 a.m. service on Friday all at River Valley Church, 55855 Bittersweet Rd., Mishawaka.
Memorial contributions may be directed to St. Joseph County 4-H Scholarship Fund.
The death could very well be the first farm fatality in Indiana for 2016.
How many farm fatalities occurred in 2015 is not available yet from Purdue University, which keeps annual records. In 2014, there were 25 farm related fatalities in Indiana, up from 18 the previous year, according to figures provided by the West Lafayette based university.
There were 26 farm deaths in the Hoosier state in 2012 and 16 in 2011.
According to Purdue reseachers, the number of farm fatalities is on a downward trend, with less than 30 deaths every year since 1996.
There were two years between 1996 and 1970 when Indiana farm deaths topped 50.