HIKE Scenario 01-04
You are the IIC of a cull cow and bull slaughter and processing establishment. Slaughter operations have been working overtime, including Saturdays, to meet the increased production demand, and the establishment is having difficulty with finding enough pen space to hold animals needed for a ten hour slaughter day.
As the IIC, you need to determine whether a noncompliance has occurred and consider what actions need to be pursued, if any, at this time. You determine that a noncompliance exists with respect to regulation 9 CFR 313.2(e); access to water had not been provided to these animals (The alleyways were closed and animals were placed inside; therefore, the alleyways became holding pens. The cited regulation requires access to drinking water in all holding pens). You inform plant management of the noncompliance, and their immediate corrective action is to fill several buckets with water and place them in the alley where the cattle can reach them. Verbally, the barn foreman informs you that the preventative measures that will be taken to ensure that all animals have access to water is to provide barrels of water for animals in an alley which will be secured by chains to prevent the barrels from being tipped over. Additionally, a receiving log will be implemented so that the plant employee(s) who receives cattle must document that water was provided to the animals penned in the alleyways. You write a Noncompliance Record (NR) using 04C02 task code and the "Protocol" trend indicator (FSIS Notice 50-02), citing the appropriate regulation, 9 CFR 313.2(e), and send a copy of the completed NR to the District Office along with the establishment's corrective actions and preventative measures. The following day you arrive at the barn and notice that animals have again been penned in the alleyways. You view the alleyways and see that filled barrels of drinking water have been placed in the improvised pens, and you observe a notation in the receiving log that the receiving employee documented that water was provided to the animals in the alley. You conclude that the animals in the alley have adequate access to water as required by 9 CFR 313.2(e). The plant employee who was responsible for unloading and penning the cattle was unaware that the cattle that he penned in the alleyways did not have access to water. Under normal circumstances, the establishment has adequate pen space to accommodate all the cattle slaughtered in a production day and these pens have permanent watering troughs. The establishment was informed, regardless of the circumstance, that they are required to actively monitor both the animals&146; environment and their handling procedures to assure regulatory requirements are being met. In this case, noncompliance should and was documented and regulatory control action taken accordingly. Moreover, the effectiveness of the corrective actions that were implemented by the establishment should be verified by inspection personnel. Appendix Regulatory References:
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