Two combine harvesters take damage, but farmers okay.
By Andrew Joseph, Farms.com; Image from Facebook video posted by Oleksand Vikul
Now this is a bad day on the farm.
We’ve all had days when the combine doesn’t want to start or it doesn’t cut the way you want it to, but how many Canadian farmers have had their day harvesting interrupted by a tank firing on you?
Such is the current lot in life for many a farmer in Ukraine.
During a video briefing on July 21, 2022, Oleksandr Vilkul, head of the military administration of Kryvyi Rih (Dnipropetrovsk Oblast), described how a Russian tank had decided to take a little target practice at a pair of combine harvesters reaping grain.
He said (translated): "Today there was an unprecedented incident—two of our combine harvesters were harvesting grain near the village of Koshove, and an enemy tank drove out and began to target these combines.
“Thank God the guys managed to escape. There was only minor shrapnel damage to the equipment."
While Farms.com is no expert in tanks, we are pretty sure that if the operator wanted to hit the combines, it would have been done. And, not having seen the combines damage received—minor shrapnel was noted—we can assume that the Russian tank operator was not trying to kill, but instead just having some fun by having the artillery explode nearby.
At least in this instance, the Russian tank mission was not to destroy the harvest, which would have placed a further burden on the farmers, as well as the people of Ukraine who depend on the crop for food.
Unfortunately, what that shows is a callous disregard for life on multiple levels.
The farmers could have swerved into the line of fire, the shrapnel could have pierced and killed the farmers, it destroyed some of the crop, and who fires at people just for fun?