Tractor driver Shaun Willis has spoken of how his life flashed before his eyes as his tractor cartwheeled down a steep slope at Rockley, near Marlborough, on Sunday.
Mr Willis, 38, had only recently returned to tractor driving after being made redundant by Honda in Swindon, where he lives with his partner Mel and their five-month-old daughter Shakira.
He said he realised he was lucky to escape with his life and just a few bumps and cuts after his seven ton German-built Fendt tractor barrel-rolled down a steep slope after the trailer it was towing jack-knifed and then broke away ripping the top off the tractor cab.
“I just followed the advice we have always been given and hung on to the steering wheel for grim life,” he said.
“I counted the rolls as the tractor cartwheeled over and over and there were all sorts of things going through my mind, my girl friend, our baby,” said Mr Willis.
He said that when the tractor stopped rolling, landing on its wheels, he could not believe he was alive. “I was pretty shaken up but I was more upset because I had written-off the tractor,” he said.
Paramedics treated him at the scene at the side of the Marlborough to Hackpen road before taking him to the Great Western Hospital in Swindon where he had stitches in a gashed knee.
The accident happened as Mr Willis helped with the harvest at Maizey Farm. Estate manager Chris Musgrave said that if Mr Willis had not been driving a Fendt tractor that was “built like a Sherman tank” the outcome would have been much more serious.
Mr Willis is a temporary harvest employee for Temple Farming, which looks after 7,000 acres including Maizey Farm. He was heading off to begin collecting wheat from a combine harvester driven by Paul Holborow.
Mr Musgrave said: “He was driving down off the downs and the trailer appeared to gain momentum and split off from the tractor and then the tractor flipped over three times.
“Wow was he a lucky man.”
As the tractor rolled for more than 50 metres its roof was ripped off, although the reinforced safety cab stayed intact protecting the driver.
Mr Willis ended up upside down in the tractor footwell and Mr Holborow rushed from his harvester to free him.
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