THE PROCESS:
To this very day its such a vivid memory that i can even remember the smell. We were killing as much as 1000 head of cattle a day (mass killing)...This is a very dangerous place to work , i will go into details that you may not want to hear after i describe the process...
First the cattle are out in the fenced yard all which is sectioned off and fill so full the cattle cant even walk around. they wait there until its time to go up the shoot. they are covered in feces which is where you will get the ecoli bacteria.
ok now the day starts at 5am with a guy out side running the cow up the ramp one by one into what we called the chute. it would lock one cow in and this is where it would be killed ( now keep in mind they DONT die right away)...this is done with a tool called a stunner gun...a guy will hold this tool up against the skull of the cow and pull a lever sending a 4 inch steel rod in and out of the skull..( in a KOSHER kill the rabbi will use a 16 inch knife and slit the throat 1000 times a day)..some days we had the Rabbi's in but most were just the standard kill.
now the cattle all inline know what is about to happen and they fight all the way up. they can smell the death just like i could. now keep in mind i was just a kid and i shouldnt have been doing this work..when you see a animal with tears in its eyes right before it gets killed it does affect you.
so now after they shoot the cow in the head it drops to the floor still moving because the nerves are still alive and kicking...now it goes to the shackler...this guy puts a steel clamp on both hind legs and then hoists the cow upside down..from this point on its all on a motor chain and doing a 1000 head a day its a fast process...now after its upside down they bleed the cow by slitting the throat form there the head is cut off and thrown on to a table where its completely boned out...NOTHING goes to waste..the brains, eyes, tongue. now it goes to another guy who slits it down the middle and removes the spleen and stomach ( the stomach is also cut open..)..now it goes to another guy who use a huge hydrolic clamps and pull the hide off...now you have a cow with no head..no cuts and no hide...then it goes to another guy who uses a huge power saw and splits it down the middle...from here it goes into the cooler and ready to be cut into peices, box and shipped out to yes your favorite supermarket....
now the dirty part that the indusrty doenst want you to know....
you have men working with knives and are cutting themselves...i seen this many many times and the blood does get on the meat and NOTHING is done about it...we would have maybe 2 or 3 USDA inspectors on the floor but they would either not see it or do nothing about it...and im quite sure its even worse today then when i did this which was 20 years ago...back then wages were double of what these men are being paid today and they work like slaves...so now you run the risk of human blood infecting the meat..you have guys droping their knives on the floor where there is waste, blood, guts ect ect...they pick the knife up without cleaning it and cut on the meat..INFECTED...
its hard to really describe what it looks like on the kill floor but its mass killing and blood is everywhere along with feces, and whatever else is falling all over the place.
the worst part is the feces which is where you can and will be affected with ecoli...the process is dirty and the USDA inspectors dont see a fraction of what gets by...I have seen so many slabs of beef that should have been destroyed and never shipped out....also there are sick cows that get killed ,..many times the inspectors will catch this and they will destroy the cow outside but trust me many many get by and for a reason...$$$$$ the owners of these packing houses dont give a shit about tainted meat..
i rarely eat beef these days and when i do all i can think about is what i just told you...you are at great risk and i feel its worse now then when i was around it....
i know when you go to the market and see it stamped USDA prime meat in a nice little package you dont even have a clue to where or how it got in that neat little package....
once the meat is infected and it doesnt matter if its from the blood of a cut worker or the feces from the cow....once it on the meat you will be eating it and not even know it....trust me folks what im telling you is the truth and i would say if you bought 10 NY strips at least 6 of them are infected....it may not be enough to make you sick but one day you may get that one steak that was the killer...i feel that in beef industry there are many sick cows being processed and sent to the markets when these animals should be destroyed....this is what is going on in europe now with the mad cow disease...
i hope that this hasnt offended anyone but not many people will talk about this subject in detail.
peace