Gathercole's Wangaratta Abattoir

57 Greta Rd, Wangaratta VIC 3677, Australia
Name: Gathercole's Wangaratta Abattoir
Address: 57 Greta Rd, Wangaratta VIC 3677, Australia
LGA/Council: Wangaratta Rural City Council
Council website: wangaratta.vic.gov.au
Council email: [email protected]
Council phone: (03) 5722 0888
Summary:

Gathercole's Slaughterhouse in Wangaratta VIC kills lambs/sheep, pigs, cows, goats and, on rare occasions, young calves who are "waste products" of the dairy industry. An employee at Gathercoles abattoir has spoken of incidents where pigs have made it through to the scalding tank still conscious, finally meeting their deaths by drowning.

Categories:
Last known status: Open and operating
Listing updated: 2024
Listing ID: 59c0f
Website: http://www.gathercole.com.au
Owned by: GA Gathercole Pty Ltd , ABN: 69 060 464 502
Property Identification Code (PIC): 3ABLK062
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10 years ago, this slaughterhouse was one of the first investigated by the recently launched organisation, Aussie Farms (now Farm Transparency Project). At the time, investigators filmed pigs, cows, sheep and calves being beaten and violently slaughtered across two, blood-soaked kill rooms. A decade later, we returned and spent two months installing cameras inside the multi-species slaughterhouse, which sits on a residential street in the busy, rural city of Wangaratta.

The scale of suffering we uncovered was so bad that we’ve had to split it across two videos.

In the cow kill room, workers force cows into a knockbox with an electric prodder, before shooting them in the head with a handheld bolt gun. Often, cows are forced into the narrow box two at a time, trampling on each other in panic as they are shot one-by-one. Our cameras revealed that, more often than not, cows would not be stunned on the first attempt, and would be shot up to four times as they thrashed and tried to escape.

Dozens of these cows are ‘spent’ dairy cows, discarded from the dairy industry at 4-6 years of age when they are no longer able to produce enough milk. These exhausted mothers were seen thrashing and kicking as their throats were cut and they slowly bled out onto the kill room floor.

ABN Lookup

ABN 69 060 464 502 (open lookup)
Entity name G. A. GATHERCOLE PTY. LTD. (from 02 May 2002)
G. A. GATHERCOLE PTY. LTD. from 01 November 1999 to 02 May 2002
ABN status Active from 01 November 1999
Entity type Australian Private Company
Goods & Services Tax (GST) Registered from 01 July 2000
Main business location VIC 3197 from 04 September 2000
ABN last updated 02 May 2002
Extracted from ABR 25 March 2024

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News (8) View all

Media releases by Farm Transparency Project (2) View all

  • Workers caught using bodies of pigs and sheep as punching bags at major Victorian slaughterhouse

    Tuesday 26 Mar 2024

    Ineffective and painful stunning causes suffering to sheep, pigs, goats and cows.  Hidden cameras captured workers at Gathercole’s Wangaratta slaughterhouse using the bodies of sheep and pigs as punching bags, hitting them as they hang suspended on the shackle line, or as they are pulled onto the kill table to have their throat slit.  Footage also shows ineffective stunning of pigs, sheep, goats and cows who are shot or electrocuted multiple times as they struggle, before their throats are slit. Gathercole’s is the 13th slaughterhouse exposed by Farm Transparency Project in the past year, as part of a... Read more >

  • Victorian slaughterhouse re-exposed by hidden cameras, 10 years after cruelty allegations

    Tuesday 5 Mar 2024

    Farm Transparency Project has released new footage of the slaughter of cows at Gathercole’s slaughterhouse in Wangaratta. The footage shows cows seemingly still conscious after multiple shots to the head, thrashing and kicking while workers pull them by their tails and poke them with sharp objects.  Gathercole’s Wangaratta slaughterhouse was investigated by the same group in 2014, with footage showing the incorrect and painful stunning of pigs and lambs. Photos and footage: https://www.farmtransparency.org/facilities/59c0f-gathercoles-wangaratta-abattoir  New hidden camera footage captured in January of this year shows cows shot in the head multiple times with a... Read more >

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