Three children killed while riding in tractor shovel
Notre-dame-de-stanbridge accident leaves seven others injured
Three children under the age of five died and seven others were injured on Wednesday after they fell from the shovel of a moving tractor.
The deaths have astounded the residents of Notre-dame-de- Stanbridge, a village about 65 kilometres south of Montreal where the accident took place. A 38-year-old man who was driving the tractor has been arrested and charged with criminal negligence.
Bloodstains and tire tracks marked the scene Thursday morning. Passersby shook their heads and wondered how it could have happened.
“Ten people in a tractor? Six children and some wood? It doesn’t make any sense,” said one person who drove past and refused to give his name.
The six children and four adults were sitting along with a pile of logs in the shovel of the tractor as it drove down Rang Ste-anne, a straight and flat road lined with crops and farmhouses.
They were thrown from the vehicle just before 7 p.m., authorities said, but it is still unclear how.
Residents said they heard the howling of ambulance sirens. Luc Perreault, who cycled past the scene Thursday morning, said he thought there had been a car accident.
He initially heard that one child was dead, but came to the area to learn more. That’s when he found out two others also died.
“I just saw the ambulances. It’s nothing you want to get close to. It’s nothing anybody wanted to see. It affected a lot of people,” he said. “It’s just bad news. … Even if you don’t know them, it’s sad. They were just little kids, little babies coming up.”
First responders rushed the injured to a hospital. They made several trips to the scene, said Perreault, who saw them coming and going. Two of the adult victims were in critical condition as of Thursday afternoon, a Sûreté du Québec spokesperson said. The three surviving children were also badly injured.
Officers arrested the driver Wednesday evening. He was charged Thursday afternoon by phone from the Granby courthouse with criminal negligence causing three deaths while operating a motor vehicle and criminal negligence causing bodily harm to six people while operating a motor vehicle.
He was charged under a section of the Criminal Code that carries a maximum life sentence if he is convicted of criminal negligence causing death.
A publication ban protecting the identities of the children prevents the driver’s name from being published. He owns a home and farmland in the area and appears to have no criminal record.
Police accident reconstruction experts visited the scene and officers seized the tractor. It will be inspected to determine if a mechanical problem played a role in the incident.
Officers periodically patrolled the area Thursday morning. Neighbours looked out their windows, but generally shut themselves away from the media.
The house next to the scene is white with a bright red roof. Discarded beer bottles lay in its yard Thursday morning, along with pieces of farm machinery and a children’s playground.
A dozen logs, ostensibly thrown from the tractor during the accident, were at the bottom of a nearby ditch.
Perreault described the community as small, tight-knit and prosperous. They were appalled to learn of the extent of the tragedy when they awoke.
“That it was children under the age of five — it is unthinkable,” Daniel Tétreault, the mayor of Notre-dame-de-stanbridge, told Radio-canada.
Several residents said the tragedy could have been a Canada Day celebration gone wrong. A neighbour said the victims had been attending a family party. She said she did not know the family, but described them as friendly people who always waved to her when their paths crossed.
It is illegal to ride in the shovel of a moving tractor, the police said. Farmers and people who lived near the scene of the accident said they had never heard of people being driven around that way, let alone falling out and ending up injured or killed.
But accidents involving farming machinery are common. In October 2019, for example, three people died in accidents that involved tractors in the span of four days in Quebec. One person was crushed by a tractor and two others were killed after becoming entangled in the engine mechanisms.