When Ilan Parente closed Bridgewater Quality Meats and moved the business to Dawson, Minnesota, and renamed it Noah’s Ark Processors, he left behind a surprise for the people of Bridgewater, South Dakota.  It wasn’t a good surprise either.  In the now-closed meat processing plant, abandoned since January 2008, he left 44 tons of kosher buffalo meat behind.  What was intended to be made into pet food was never claimed, and once the electricity got shut off for nonpayment, well… the stink was unimaginable.

It took 5 dump trucks and 3 extra-large trash bins to haul out the 88,420 pounds of meat and maggots from within the plant.  A force of 18 city and county workers donned haz-mat suits and gas masks to clean out the plant, because the stink was so bad it had corrupted the entire town of 600 people.  Every building reeked of bad meat.

Just writing about that turns my stomach.  Ugh.  I hate the smell of rotting food; that’s why if I don’t eat something within a few days, it gets tossed out.  It might still be edible, but I’m not going to take chances.  I’ve had food poisoning twice, and I’m not going to get it again.

Tags: Bridgewater, South Dakota, Ilan Parente, Bridgewater Quality Meats, Noah’s Ark Processors, 44 tons of rotten meat, rotting meat stinks up entire town, buffalo meat, rotting meat, health hazards, Dawson, Minnesota, bison meat

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