Four people were airlifted from Shaw Island with injuries and 40 people with less severe injuries were treated on island after a hayride went “terribly wrong,” according to the San Juan County Sheriff’s Department.

None of the injuries are considered life threatening.

On the morning of Sunday, July 24, roughly 50 people from two Washington church youth groups, on a weekend retreat at Our Lady of the Rock Monastery, took a hayride on a flatbed trailer carried by a farm tractor.  As they traveled down Hoffman Cove Road on a downhill grade, the trailer overpowered the tractor, causing the tractor to jackknife.

According to the Sheriff’s Department, the tractor’s drawbar bent and the front axle of the trailer failed, dumping its occupants off the trailer. The tractor never left the roadway or rolled over.

The tractor and trailer, owned by the monastery, was operated by a 46-year-old Bellingham man.

The accident remains under investigation.