IF EVER we needed reminding that lawnmowers and garden machinery in general can be lethal and dangerous, comes the news this week of at least three horrific accidents.
No matter that they all happened in the US in a single week. They can happen anywhere, anytime, any place.

Lawncare contractor Cody Bennett (29) drowned after being pinned under his zero-turn mower after attempting to cut a steep bank above a drainage ditch in Goodlettsville, Tennessee. He wanted to speed up the job, said a colleague, “but it was just too steep for that machine” Also in Tennessee this week, a four-year boy was run over by a lawnmower and suffered severe cuts to arms and legs. There was some suggestion that the boy was riding on the lap of the person operating the ride-on mower.

In another high-profile case in Florida, 2-year Ireland Nugent lost both feet and part of her right arm last week when her father inadvertedly reversed over her with his lawn tractor when he mistook her waving at him,  believing that she was trying to tell him that he was about to run over something. The police accept that it was simply a tragic accident.

None of these accidents could have prevented by safety devices on the machines, they were caused by human error, by carelessness and in two cases, of letting young children play in the vicinty of lethal machiney.

It is easily done, especially in Spring when excitement builds that the winter is over and the rush is on to get the garden shipe-shape.
Can, or should, the industry do more to highlight the inherent dangers of the equipment it sells? Possibly yes. Will people heed warnings to take the utmostcare?  I’d like to think so, but I’m not so sure . . .


I’M PLEASED to tell you that the Service Dealer Business Quarterly has now gone to press and will be out next week. It’s been quite an undertaking to get the inaugural issue of the this new-look publication out, and I hope you will like what you see.

FINALLY, as you can see, my daughter Emma who looked after the Service Dealer advertising for a year, is competing in the London Marathon this Sunday. An event now given extra piquancy by the tragic news from Boston earlier in the week.  It seems that virtually every competitor is determined to take part not only for their own chosen cause (Emma is running for the wonderful Macmillan cancer support charity), but they are doing so to demonstrated their support for those who were so cruelly robbed of life and limb in Boston.  If you fell able to support Macmillan through Emma’s participation then details in this newsletter)