High-Speed Chicken Slaughterhouse Exposed: Amick Farms Maryland Plant Investigated

A COK investigator worked inside this Hurlock, Maryland high-speed facility that kills up to 175 birds each minute. That’s as many as over one million birds every week.

COK: ‘Powerful new investigative footage by Compassion Over Killing (COK) exposes heartbreaking cruelty to birds inside a Maryland slaughterhouse — one of 24 chicken plants allowed by the USDA to operate at dangerously fast kill line speeds. In 2018, a COK investigator worked inside this Hurlock, Maryland high-speed facility that kills up to 175 birds each minute. That’s as many as over one million birds every week. Most facilities operate at the already staggering rate of killing up to 140 birds per minute…

Up until last month, 20 plants were allowed to operate at the high-speed rate of killing 175 birds per minute. Despite alarming problems present at high-speed plants — including what COK caught on camera at Amick Farms — the USDA recently allowed four more chicken slaughter plants to increase their speeds… Even before arriving at the slaughterhouse, birds endure egregious abuse, severe overcrowding, filthy conditions, and the painful, crippling effects of unnaturally rapid growth. At Amick and in other slaughterhouses operating with these increased line speeds, birds can endure suffering beyond cruel standard practices…

This is the second time in just a few years that a COK investigation has exposed the horrors of high-speed slaughter, yet the USDA continues to move forward with its dangerous program. In late 2015, a COK investigator worked inside Quality Pork Processors, a high-speed pig slaughter plant supplying Hormel Foods revealing pigs shocked, dragged, and pulled to the kill floor; pigs covered in feces and pus-filled abscesses processed for human consumption with a USDA seal of approval; and more. COK has since delivered over a quarter million signatures against high-speed pig slaughter to the USDA’. SOURCE…

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