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| 30-year-old Dustin Lee Arthur, dead, buried by soybeans |
In a tragic farming accident, 30-year-old Dustin Arthur died when he suffocated in an Amelia grain elevator Tuesday. Friends remember him as hard working and say he died living his dream.
"Anybody that knew him, loved him,” Jamie Murray said. “He was one-in-a-million and the world lost the most amazing person I have ever met."
AMELIA COURTHOUSE, Va. (AP) — Authorities say a Virginia farm worker was killed when he became buried in soybeans.
The Richmond Times-Dispatch cites an Amelia County Sheriff's Office release that says 30-year-old Dustin Lee Arthur was pronounced dead at the scene Tuesday evening.
The sheriff's office said Arthur was wearing a safety harness and tethered to a grain bin which he was working to repair at Featherstone Farm Seed on Genito Road.
He was trying to get the soybeans to flow properly, but the workers on the outside of the bin lost contact with him.
Amelia County's director of emergency management, Kent Emerson, says rescuers had to create a way to safely enter the bin before digging to find Arthur, who was found deceased.
Emerson said Arthur was killed as farm workers were unloading the grain bin into a container truck.
Local media reported Arthur had been fixing grain bins for years, according to his girlfriend, and was always quick to help his friends. His body was taken to the Medical Examiner's Office where an official cause of death will be determined.
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An Amelia County worker was killed Tuesday when he was buried in soybeans while working to free the flow of the beans in a grain bin, authorities said.
The Amelia Sheriff’s Office was called about 5:15 p.m for a report of a man trapped in a grain bin on a farm in the 13000 block of Genito Road, the office said in a news release. Dustin Lee Arthur, 30, was pronounced dead at the scene.
Arthur’s body was found inside the bin after authorities worked to locate and free him. He had been wearing a safety harness and was tethered to the bin, the sheriff’s office said.
“When our folks arrived on scene, they had to safely create a way to enter the bin,” said Kent Emerson, director of emergency management. “When the rescuer was finally able to get in to gain access to the patient — they had to do some digging — they were able to determine very quickly that he was already deceased.”
Emerson said the accident occurred as farm workers were unloading beans into a container truck.