Animal rights protesters blamed for death of racehorse – trainer

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Animal rights protesters are to blame for the death of a racehorse at the British Grand National, its trainer has claimed.

On Saturday, Hill Sixteen fell at the first fence and suffered an “irrecoverable injury”; two other horses also had to be taken to a horse ambulance for further evaluation.

The event had to be delayed due to protests from campaign group Animal Rising; 118 people were arrested by police and trainer Sandy Thompson told The Hard Shoulder the disturbance left the horses upset.

Hill Sixteen had jumped around Aintree twice, he was well used to the fences, he said.

Statistics show that the fences were changed nine years ago and in those nine years less than two horses on average fell or were knocked off the first and second fences.

On Saturday there were eight horses that fell or were thrown off and it was only because it had become very difficult because of these protesters.

Animal Rising spokeswoman Orla Coghlan expressed her condolences to Mr Thomson on the death of Hill Sixteen, but said they were not responsible for the deaths of the horses.

I think the protesters bear absolutely no responsibility for this death, she said.

I want to make it very clear that frankly it is an outrage for the horse racing industry to try to deflect blame for the horrors that are happening.

Three horses are known to have died over the weekend, there have been a further 49 deaths in British horse racing since the start of the year.

And last year at the Grand National four horses died – are we to blame for those?

Horse racing at Ratoath, Meath. Picture by Harry Murphy/Sportsfile

Mr Thomson said only a very small proportion of horses die and the racing industry is working to improve safety.

Changed that all the time and it’s very sad [when] the horses unfortunately die, he says.

We don’t want this to happen, but we can’t guarantee that when you have a horse race [wont] die.

Animal Rising believes horse racing should be banned and Ms Coughlan said the group will continue to disrupt industry events.

We believe that most good people really care about animals [and] really care about horses, she says.

I have no doubt that Sandy Thomson loves the horses in his care – but I don’t think our actions are in line with our values.

I don’t think a horse dies every other day in races in Britain, I don’t think that’s acceptable and I don’t think that’s a real sign of animal care.

Horse racing contributes $1.84 billion to the Irish economy and supports 29,000 jobs.

Main Image: Hill Sixteen. Photo by: Alamy.com

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