Jefferson County accident kills pigs on way to slaughterhouse

A semitrailer hauling about 160 pigs to a slaughterhouse went off the road early Wednesday south of Valley Falls and overturned.

About half of the pigs were killed in the accident on Kansas Highway 4, said Capt. Tim Byers of the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office.

The truck driver, James H. Thompson Jr., of Turpin, Okla., lost control of the vehicle, which went into a ditch, according to a Kansas Highway Patrol report. He and a passenger, Jeffrey D. Thompson, 9, were taken to Stormont-Vail Regional Health Center in Topeka, where a hospital official said they were treated and released.

A second truck picked up the pigs that survived the accident, and they were taken to the slaughterhouse, Byers said.