A rescue call to a farm on the 6200 block of Meadeville Road in Salisbury Township on Sunday afternoon brought the Lancaster County Coroner’s Office and Pennsylvania State Police to the scene after someone reportedly fell into a manure pit. County dispatch said crews were called out around 4 p.m. following a report that a person had gone into the pit, and the coroner’s office was notified of the incident by 5 p.m.
The Lancaster County Coroner’s Office was called to a rescue in Salisbury Township Sunday afternoon, according to Local 21 News, which cited county dispatch in reporting that crews were sent to the 6200 block of Meadeville Road near the Chester County border after a caller reported someone falling into a manure pit. Pennsylvania State Police are investigating the incident, dispatch told the station. LancasterOnline reported that firefighters and EMS were dispatched to the farm and that emergency crews from Lancaster and Chester counties indicated one individual had fallen into the pit and had not surfaced for more than 15 minutes, though that detail has not been independently confirmed.
Scene Cleared, Investigation Handed to State Police
Fire and emergency medical crews cleared the area shortly before 5:30 p.m. Sunday, with dispatchers saying the scene was then turned over to Pennsylvania State Police. As of Sunday evening, no response had been received from either the coroner’s office or state police when contacted for further details, and the outlet noted its report would be updated as more information became available. The person’s identity, age, and condition have not been confirmed, and it remains unclear whether the fall involved any of the gas or oxygen hazards associated with manure storage.
A Known Hazard on Pennsylvania Farms
Manure storages can pose serious dangers to anyone who falls or climbs into them. Penn State Extension warns that the hazards inside a confined-space manure storage can include a lack of oxygen, toxic and flammable gases, and the risk of drowning, according to the university’s Confined Space Manure Storage Hazards guidance. A federal safety alert from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention describes seven deaths from asphyxiation in just two incidents involving entry into manure pits, underscoring how quickly such accidents can turn fatal.
Farm fatalities remain a persistent concern across the state. Pennsylvania recorded 19 deaths from farm-related injuries in 2025, and Lancaster County was one of just three counties statewide to report more than one fatality that year, according to a Penn State review of the most recent state farm fatality report. Nearly half of those deaths involved off-road or industrial vehicles, the report found, while more than a third resulted from compression or contact with equipment, objects, or buildings.
Manure Pit Tragedies Have Struck Lancaster County Before
This is not the first time a manure pit has claimed attention in the region. A Lancaster County man and two of his sons died after apparently drowning in a manure pit at a Maryland farm where they were working, LancasterOnline previously reported, with state police investigators saying at the time that they were unsure how all three victims became submerged and had no evidence of foul play. In a separate case the same outlet documented, 4-year-old Josiah Martin died on New Year’s Day 2011 after falling into an open manure lagoon near New Holland, and Amos J. Stoltzfus of Christiana died after jumping into a Virginia farm manure pit during a rescue attempt that ultimately claimed five lives to toxic gases rising from the pit.
Nationally, Purdue University’s confined-space injury database recorded two livestock-waste storage pit or lagoon incidents in 2023, and both were fatal; the same report counted four agricultural confined-space cases in Pennsylvania that year, though it does not specify how many involved manure pits specifically. Researchers estimate that roughly 30% of such cases go unreported or undocumented altogether. A Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection spokeswoman told LancasterOnline the state has up to 10,000 manure pits, and a Purdue study cited by the outlet found more than 130 deaths and injuries tied to manure storage and handling, with more than a third of those involving people who attempted rescues.
