When Pigs Fly

This week in Las Vegas a truck pulling a semi load of hogs headed to slaughter overturned on the I-15 and I-215 offramp causing a 7 hour traffic delay. The Nevada Highway Patrol did not want to just flip the trailer over for fear the hogs would just scatter out and cause a larger mess.

This story reminded me of a story Terry Wheller told me when i was a kid. For the record Terry Wheller is a Lake Andes, SD native who worked for my family in the pork processing business in the 70's and continued on with my father at his tractor parts company and retired in 1995. Terry was an accountant by degree but spent many years bouncing around from truck driver and spotter for crop dusters in Texas and Oklahoma. Terry always had a great story to tell even if I had heard it before.

Terry once told me a story about when is was hauling a load of hogs at night and was approaching a train crossing which was not marked with lights. As he was approaching the crossing he noticed a train was coming and to avoid a collision he flipped his truck instead of collide with the train. Due to the rollover pigs were laying all over the place. The local sheriff who responded to the accident decided it was best to put many of the pigs out of their misery and pulled out his service revolver out and starting his own roadside slaughterhouse.

I guess the Nevada Highway Patrol didn't want to waste the bullets.

Big H