An Argyllshire farmer had a narrow escape from a landslide caused by the incessant rain last Saturday when it carried away a pick-up with a trailer attached that he managed to leave just moments before the impact.
Stuart Campbell, a farm manager at Cladich, near Dalmally, was travelling near Ardfern, south of Oban, on Saturday (October 7) when the road was blocked by a landslide ahead of him, before a second landslide behind his vehicle and trailer, and another car effectively blocked them in.
He told The SF: “I got out of the pick-up to ask the driver of the car behind to move so that I could reverse, but by that time a second landslide had effectively hemmed us in. I then heard a bit of a rumble above us and decide that the best option was to run to safer ground. And when I turned around a third landslide had carried the pick-up and trailer, plus the other car away.
“It was a lucky escape,” he said. “I’m not sure what would have happened to us if we had still been in the pick-up.”
Mr Campbell later made it to Oban for the Highland cattle sale set-up day on the same day and was in charge of producing the leading price of the sale on Monday for the Cladich fold, owned by Jon and Queenie Strickland. That was 11,000gns, creating a new record price for a calf when Capleadh Ruadh of Cladich sold to long-time breed enthusiast, Angus MacGillivray’s Highland Cattle Services, a new business which will essentially promote top bloodlines for sale vi AI and embryo transfer.
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