Day 104 - 15 Mar 95 - Page 49
1
2 Q. With the old baths, the one-and-a-half-metre baths that
3 used to be 13 birds in them, how long would they remain in
4 there?
5 A. I do not know. I think it was a little bit longer
6 because it was a longer bath.
7
8 Q. But obviously that would be something that was dependent on
9 the speed that the line was moving?
10 A. Yes, it would do.
11
12 Q. When was Dr. Perry at Sun Valley?
13 A. He was there when I came to the company, and I think he
14 left in probably about 1984.
15
16 Q. You said that you used to use AC current. Dr. Gregory said
17 he thought that you probably changed from 25 milliamps to
18 16 milliamps at the same time you switched over from a
19 13-bird bath to an eight-bird bath. Would that be right?
20 A. It might be. I really do not know.
21
22 Q. Does Sun Valley have an easily visible ammeter fitted to
23 the stunners to make it possible to check the current?
24 A. Yes, it does.
25
26 Q. How long has it had that?
27 A. Really since the new installation was put in two years
28 ago.
29
30 Q. So prior to that there was no ----
31 A. It could be read before but it had to be done by a
32 qualified electrician because it required access to a
33 particular area that was relatively inaccessible.
34
35 Q. So, at that time, the water bath area had restricted
36 access?
37 A. The water bath area itself did not have restricted
38 access; only the control box.
39
40 Q. How often would that have been checked?
41 A. Well, the checking was done more on the reaction and
42 behaviour of the birds going into the stunning bath rather
43 than reading dials on pieces of equipment.
44
45 Q. So basically they would not really use the dials apart from
46 on rare occasions?
47 A. The dials were not part of daily use because it was
48 felt to be more valuable just to observe the operation
49 actually in practice.
50
51 Q. It is actually a recommendation in the 1991 MAFF code of
52 practice to have a visible ammeter, is it not?
53 A. Yes.
54
55 Q. The Simmons Engineering documents we looked at yesterday
56 said if you remove a bird from the shackle after using
57 their prestunner it will revive completely within two
58 minutes or less. Have you tested to see whether that
59 happens at Sun Valley?
60 A. No. We are not allowed to do that.
