Hidden Cameras Expose Extreme Cruelty Inside Australia's Largest Pig Slaughterhouse

Activists plant hidden cameras over gas chambers in the Corowa NSW slaughterhouse, capturing world-first footage as the pigs suffocate in apparent ‘humane’ conditions.

The footage, filmed over three days in February, was provided anonymously to new animal rights organisation Aussie Farms, and depicts pigs being forced into the gas chamber by excessive use of an electric prodder including on the face and in the ear. In one instance, an injured pig who is unable to walk into the chamber is kicked, then tossed aside and trampled by other pigs for over ten minutes before finally being pushed into the chamber. Once inside the chamber, pigs are lowered into the gas and are seen screaming and thrashing as they suffocate. The footage has been handed to NSW Police by Chris Delforce, Operations Director of Aussie Farms, who expects charges to be laid against the owner of the abattoir, Rivalea.

Mr Delforce said, “Every time a farm or slaughterhouse has been exposed for cruelty in Australia, the industry responds that it’s a one-off, a rogue operator. This is the largest pig slaughterhouse in the country. Nobody can say this is a rogue operator, and how many more instances like this do we need to find before we start to accept that there is something systemically and inherently wrong with the way we treat animals raised for consumption in this country? This is how most pigs in Australia are killed; these chambers have been installed at around 15 different slaughterhouses across the country including most, or all, of the big players.”

“The excessive use of the electric prod, or the kicking of the animals, isn’t, I’d say, the most disturbing thing about this footage. Instead it’s the systematic, mechanised, impersonal nature of it - these intelligent animals, some of them from so-called ‘free range’ systems, are being treated as units of production. These pigs are terrified. As they’re moved from the holding pens up through the different sections of the race, they can hear the screams from inside the gas chamber up ahead. They know what’s going to happen and this is why we’re seeing so many of them trying so desperately to jump out. They don’t want to go in there.”

“Carbon dioxide gassing has been touted as the most humane method of slaughtering pigs. After seeing this footage I think it’s fair to say that there is no humane method of slaughtering pigs. People are being lied to, and it’s time the truth, which for so long has been so well-hidden, to finally come out. If most people knew that this is what was going on, they would never support it.”