Check my shorts - share your close calls...

[jnldr]

Glad I'm not the only one. I was mowing Sat and clearing along a spring branch. Parts are steep and parts are not. I was being cautious and came across a BIG hole. Well I marked it in my mind and went on about my business. I came back to the area to finish out some stuff and yep, not paying attention my front left tire went off in the hole. Something that happens in 3 seconds seems like 5 minutes. As I felt the back end start to come over I froze for a second and then just had to let it go.
It swallowed up my front tire and my bush hog and right rear were in the air.
It's a 3540 and I could put my foot flat on the ground while buckled in.
After I got my senses back and took a breath I realized I had ( subconsciously)
used my bucket to keep it from going all the way over. Took a breath and used my bucket to walk it out. I was lucky, if the whole was 2 feet closer to the bank I would have flipped it for sure. Not a fun ride...


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[Missouribound]

The only thing worth more than advice is experience.

 

[MaleHoe]

Three years ago I was mowing with my JD X495 near a very steep 30 foot cliff at the back corner of my property. I mow ( no, used to mow ) right up to the edge until the front tires where real close.

Not sure what happened, started to back away but the tractor wanted to go the other way, over the cliff.

It's steep, about 70-80 degrees and 30 feet high with the top 10 feet near vertical.

I swear in the 2 seconds it took to reach the bottom I actually had a lot of things flash though my mind. One of them was "I never thought I would die like this". I really did think it was going to be bad at the very least.

Suddenly everything was quiet and dark. For a second I thought I was dead.

Then I realized my eyes were clamped shut from fear maybe and I opened them. I was still in the seat, tractor shutoff but started right up and I drove it through the woods back up to my yard.

I got off and checked the JD and there was nothing wrong. My back was a bit sore from the landing but I was fine. I was starting to get the shakes from thinking about what just happened so I got back on and back to mowing and trying not to think about it.

Every time I'm near that cliff I look over the edge.