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Here's the full story--horrible to read! Farmer Describes Cutting Off Own Arm Sat Nov 24 A Kershaw County, S.C. farmer has recovered enough to recount how he had to cut off his own arm to save his life. Sampson Parker talked to WIS reporter Dan Tordjman, and explained that after he got his hand stuck in a piece of farm equipment and a fire broke out around him, he had no choice. "If I was going to die here, I was going to put up a fight, and that's basically what I did," says Sampson Parker. Parker was working in a field on his farm when he noticed a cornstalk stuck in rusty mechanical picker. "I went up with my hand and the roller that takes the shucks off the corn had grabbed the glove and pulled my hand into the rollers," Parker said. "The more I tried pulling my hand out, the farther up my hand went." On his knees, his hand stuck in the picker, Parker tried calling for help, but no one answered. "Would've probably have passed out before anybody got here," he said. Parker?s hand went numb as about an hour passed, and he used a rod to jam the machine. He made the decision to cut his arm out of the machine. He used a John Deere pocket knife and started to cut away his fingers. But before Parker could get free, the rod caused the machine to spark, and burst into flame. With his right hand still caught in the machine, Parker used his left hand to try to fight back the fire that was spreading in the grass around him. "My skin was melting. It was dripping off my arm like plastic, plastic melting. I realized I was in trouble," he said. Parker said he grabbed his knife again. "And I just jammed it into my arm, just like that, just started cutting away from the bone -- just dropped," he said. Badly burned and bleeding from his severed arm, Parker drove to the road in front of his house. At that moment, a firefighter from Kershaw passed by. Firefighter Doug Spinks said, "My biggest fear was this guy is going to die on me right here and there's nothing else I can do, other than what I've done." Spinks wrapped Parker?s arm and called for help. Parker said that Spinks saved his life. "I'm just thankful I was there," Spinks said. Now Parker said he is moving on, and is not bitter about what happened. "(I) came down here, had a prayer with God and the corn picker and me. Made it easier. Made peace with it," he said.
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