Video: Teaching teenagers safe tractor tactics
North East West Kerry Development (NEWKD) said that additional government funding will be used to enhance its course teaching teenagers safe skills around tractors.
The Safe Tractor Driving Skills course, developed by the NEWKD Farm Families Committee, has now been running for around 12 years.
Teenagers aged from 14 to 17 years can attend the one-day course held at various locations in Kerry, Cork, and Limerick.
Agriland recently went along to the course held at Castleisland Mart and spoke with those involved. You can see more by clicking on the video below:
John Dalton, the coordinator Safe Tractor Driving Skills course, told Agriland that the teenagers are taught skills around driving tractors, while they also receive some basic first aid training.
He said that a lot of young people are driving tractors without "any awareness of the dangers of a big machine".
"We feel that if you get them at that young age they're willing to learn and listen, we all know they will listen to a stranger before they listen to their mother and father," he added.
Dalton thanked FBD and Lee Strand for sponsoring the course, along with the marts for providing the use of their premises and the garages who supplied tractors for the events.
The Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (DAFM) recently awarded funded of €1.68 million for 40 projects related to farm safety, health and wellbeing.
As part of this allocation, NEWKD was awarded €19,600 towards its Safe Tractor Driving Skills course.
Along with safe driving skills, the teenagers learn about maintaining a tractor in good condition and how to properly get on and off the vehicle using the three steps.
Martin Brosnan, a trainer with FRS Training, said the driving section, which includes reversing a tractor and trailer and navigating an obstacle course, is adapted to the experience of teenagers.
"The young people that we have coming to us, they're really sponges for information. They're absolutely super.
"If I correct them on the first run, they will have that perfected by the second time they're up.
"So they're really brilliant at picking up the information at this age. It's about starting them young so they will keep the skillset with them right through going forward," he said.
Brosnan said that young people are not supposed to drive a tractor on farms until they are 14 and should not operate a power take-off (PTO) until they are 16.
Stephen Keane of Blackwood Training said the first aid training teaches the teenagers how to respond to emergencies on the farm.
"We ensure at the end of the course that all the people who attend will have a good understanding of basic first aid and more importantly what to do in the event that something does go wrong," he said.
The course covers phoning the emergency services, basic bandaging, recognising medical emergencies, using a defibrillator and performing CPR.
"Every year, we get back statistics from the Health and Safety Authority (HSA) and unfortunately farm accidents are quite high on that list. A lot of it is because people work on their own.
"What we want to try and do is protect our young people coming forward into the farming community," Keane said.
