The Bascetta family receive 200 pounds of meat

By Lindsey Pizzica Rotolo

In the early morning hours of September 29, Brendan Tallon, 21, was driving home from Hartford with a friend from college. Less than two miles from their destination, the Norwich University students were startled to see a moose standing in the middle of Route 44.

“There was a car coming in the other direction, and the moose was a little bit more on my side of the road, so I swerved to the right. I was going to miss it, and then, at the very last second, she turned her head and smashed her face into my windshield,” Tallon said.

The moose was just past the sharp curve in the road near the home of Kathy and John Bascetta, and Tallon was traveling at a speed of around 50 mph, so he wasn’t able to come to a complete stop. “She was huge, and her face was so long. I really thought I was going to miss her completely,” Tallon said. He continued on home after hitting the animal with the intention of reporting the incident in the morning, but a state trooper noticed the injured moose on the Bascetta’s driveway around 4:30 a.m.

A couple of hours before dawn, Kathy and John Bascetta woke to a ringing doorbell. Their hearts sank when they saw a state trooper standing on their doorstep. “We of course assumed it would be bad news involving one of our daughters,” Kathy Bascetta said. But their dread was quickly abated when the trooper reported that a badly injured moose had made its way onto their property. He wanted to know if they were capable of disposing of the moose’s remains if he shot it.

At least some good fortune was in play that night. John Bascetta is an avid hunter as well as a stone mason, so not only did he have the appropriate scaffolding to hang the animal on, but knew who to call to help him process the meat. He was also able to get Glen Wheeler to open the transfer station so they could dispose of the remains. The trooper was shocked to find absolutely no trace of the animal’s carcass when he returned to the Bascetta home a few hours later.

The animal weighed an estimated 700 pounds, which yielded about 200 pounds of meat. The meat was divvied up between the Bascettas and those who helped them out that Sunday morning. The Bascettas also shared some of their meat with the chef at Infinity Hall, who used it to prepare a delicious employee meal, and with Nancy McGrath, a co-worker of Bascetta’s from the Norfolk post office.

“She did not die in vain,” said Nancy McGrath, who made a moose stew and moose chili with the meat she was given. “The meat was really delicious.”

Once rare, moose sightings in Norfolk have been numerous this past summer and fall. Hunters and outdoorsmen in the country’s northern regions claim that frequent moose sightings in the milder months means a long, hard winter is coming. If the weather in late November was any indication, they may be onto something.

Photo courtesy of the Bascetta Family.