Phelps County Extension Educator Todd Whitney said he had heard that two irrigation companies in Holdrege had received 50 requests each to repair or replace pivots.
“A lot of producers have had 10 or 14 pivots that had damage to them,” he said.
David Hoferer, design manager at Central Valley Irrigation in Holdrege, said it has received phone calls to repair or replace 58 pivots. He said over half that number will be total replacements.
“It seems like we got deja vu all over again,” Hoferer said. “In the summer of 2014 is when we had 200 plus pivots go over in that wind storm. It seems like Father’s Day weekend is doomsday for us, it seems like something always happens.”
Hoferer said the company won’t get out to make the repairs and replacements until insurance goes through for the farmers.
Kirk Edgren, a farmer north of Bertrand, said he lost six pivots, which he said will probably need to be replaced. He also had damage to buildings and crops.
His shop building doors blew in and part of the roof blew off; he had hail damage to two of his mobile homes; his grain bin walls were pushed in; and the end and back walls of his barn blew out. There was hail damage to what he estimated was 60 percent of his corn and soybeans. He said it is too late to replant, but the crops may survive.
Edgren said he guessed that the hail that damaged his property was somewhere between pea to marble-sized, but he didn’t know for sure because he couldn’t see well enough through the wind and rain.
He said he has insurance for his pivots and crops.
“It’s kind of what you sign up for,” he said of being a farmer.
Whitney said he and a group from the USDA were to look at crops this morning to see the extent of the damage.
Whitney said though he has “seen some pictures from farmers that look really severe. There was an area where it shredded not only the leaves but some of the stalks.”
Whitney said he hopes some of the crops will be able to recover.
In Buffalo County, the greatest damage was done to trees in the Riverdale area, said Buffalo County Emergency Management Director Darrin Lewis. He said there was also a lightning strike that hit a home in that area and law enforcement arranged for the home’s occupant to stay with her son in Elm Creek because she was without power for a while.
Source - http://www.kearneyhub.com/
