NOT all the chicks died. But of the thousands that hatched during those first few days of February, some so weak they had to be helped out by hand, only about one-third survived the ordeal. Those that did survive remained frail and sickly. Large numbers of hens died too.
For the large Belgian poultry breeder, De Brabander, this inexplicable act of God spelled financial disaster. Especially, according to one magazine report, when the insurance firm refused to pay up for the loss of the company's stock without further investigation.
By then there must also have been signs that something was wrong at other farms. If so, it was not a subject anyone wanted to bring to public attention.
Now, four months later, the poisoning of millions of chickens, pigs and cattle has brought Belgian agriculture to a standstill, cleared the supermarket shelves of food, and forced the internationally renowned luxury chocolatier Leonidas to close its shops. It has led to the resignation of Belgium's agriculture minister, and the sense of betrayal felt throughout the country could bring down the government at this weekend's national and European Parliament polls.
From Hong Kong to the United States, Belgian and other European Union products are banned. The EU itself has ordered suspect Belgian products off the market.
But in March no-one was thinking of international scandals.
It all began at that one farm, but the way in which cancer-causing dioxin may have got into animal feed, how it spread and how the feed industry has reacted is a damning story of how modern food is produced.
