after todays flag incident at badminton......

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georgiegirl2

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after todays terrible tregedy at badminton do you think design of fence flags is going to be looked at? It was a horrible one off accident although in these modern days im sure there could be alternative materials which could be used to protect horses (and riders - trust me - fence flags hurt if you prang one!) ie mandatory plastic ones or high density rigid foam for example which will stay sure and upright but without the potential for injury? Your thoughts please.....
 
i think tbh it was a frak accident.....maybe plastic flagoles are worth looking into if they were not plastic already.....but i have never seen anything like that i mean a lot of the time they are knocked but with the help of velcro they just fall down...could you eveer really be completely sure that a fence post would do no damage at all? such a sad freak accident but im my opinion it doesnt justify a hoo-hah about whether or not fence posts are safe.
 
I'd pick rubber over plastic. Plastic has a habit of bouncing up and legs getting stuck in it, not to mention plastic can still break and leave sharp edges.

I do, however, think it was a freak one in a million accident. I've re-watched the footage several times and judging by the flow of blood, I'm not surprised he sadly died. I would assume his heart rate would have been up high exerting himself which would have added to the rate of blood loss.

Tragic, tragic accident. No one could predict such a thing.
 
Oh I totally agree with you there it was a complete freak accident. The vicarage vee flags looked to me to be wooden (i may be mistaken) all im saying is in modern eventing could we be utilising other materials? I think the velcro idea they have in place is a great one and you could see from the corner in huntsmans close how often that came into use....but, surely any advancement on materials used would not be a bad thing in modern day eventing no matter how 'freak' the accident was we should be doing all we can to minimise injuries to horses and riders.

I work in operating theatres and even so called 'freak' incidents which would probably never happen again are looked into and things are put in place to help them reoccuring however small the risk. Surely this is something we could be doing for our horses?
 
I am surprised in this day and age of health and safety that the flags aren't that foam or rubber or bend plastic!

It was one freak accident too many. the flags in the Huntsmans was being knocked off quite a bit and Jonty seemed to be lame himself after knocking a flag.

BE should look at this seriously and look at racing-plastic and rubber everywhere and no wood!
 
we witnessed it and i will say the rider knew istantly something was wrong and within 5 strides and the crowd shouting he pulled up, got off. the owner or groom was very upset and it was heart breaking to watch. fence 8seemed to have sme bad luck, what with the dog chase and full credit to the steward who rugby takled him. I am very soorry to hear the horse has passed away, when he drove off he wasnt standing in the ambulance, we were later told he may be ok. RIP.
 
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we witnessed it and i will say the rider knew istantly something was wrong and within 5 strides and the crowd shouting he pulled up, got off. the owner or groom was very upset and it was heart breaking to watch. fence 8seemed to have sme bad luck, what with the dog chase and full credit to the steward who rugby takled him. I am very soorry to hear the horse has passed away, when he drove off he wasnt standing in the ambulance, we were later told he may be ok. RIP.

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Might have seen you there then Flintus - if I knew what you looked like! - we were also at this fence for the accident. It was absolutely horrific, and I agree the rider did know something was up almost immediately. He looked devastated, I believe he went in the horse ambulance car pulling the trailer.

The horse was down in the trailer taken away, with what looked like someone holding an IV drip up through the open grooms door. i couldn't see how it could survive that blood loss though.......poor thing, at least it's not in pain now.
 
i will say the crowd acted swiflty and in this case had no complaints of them jumping in, thw woman took a top off and tied it around him. The owner/groom?? in the red look devastated and my heart goes out to them. not sure if he has passed away, have we really lost another noble outstanding horse?! the rider went in the car and i think it was the vet hanging out the jockey door. i dont blame rider or horse just a sad accident. PLASTIC FLAGS BE!!!! like those of ski-ing or moe them away, also the horse AFTER the hrse who had the accident did so well with the dog running after him, especially after he ran infront of the jump... one woman near us was shouting alot of things and one was kick the bloody thing! ot the dogs fault...owner should be highly embarrassed!
 
he died flintus
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sorry, they exist over here, and I can't imagine how a horse would get stabbed like that. They are used in every event I've been to.
 
Its been an accident waiting to happen for a long time. I've never understood why they dont make them half the size and safely affixed so the flag is level with the top of the fence. If it had then maybe today's accident would not have happened.
I'm not interested with the same old cliche " that you must expect accidents with horses" this is one that could've been avoided. But as usual it always takes a disaster before anything is done.

I've 30 years of horse owning, riding and competing and you can never eliminate risks with horses but you can reduce them. My saying is that horses can be hazardous in the right hands and downright dangerous in the wrong hands. I'm pragmatic but today's accident wasn't just a freak these flags have no place at being on corner angled fences - yeah, they really hurt when you whack your knee. Today, a poor horse lost his life to one!
 
I believe it was a total freak, terrible accident. These horses are jumping over huge fixed obstacles at speed and who has ever known this happen? The danger has been the fences
not the flags! Just terrible awful bad luck but now maybe they can look at changing the design. I don't believe this could have been avoided! This is a dangerous sport! Oh, unless we remove the flags and the jumps!
 
What about flags on springs for all corners and skinny's - like that skinny at WEG had. It would prevent freak accidents like this happening in the future...
 
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You could have flags made out of the rubber skiing flag materials that they use when racing.

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Good idea!
 
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i think tbh it was a frak accident.....maybe plastic flagoles are worth looking into if they were not plastic already.....but i have never seen anything like that i mean a lot of the time they are knocked but with the help of velcro they just fall down...could you eveer really be completely sure that a fence post would do no damage at all? such a sad freak accident but im my opinion it doesnt justify a hoo-hah about whether or not fence posts are safe.

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I saw the accident and still feel sick now.

I think rubber flags should definitely be looked into and placed on skinny fences, how many horse deaths does it take for something to be looked in 2!!! Surely one is enough!!
 
If it was your horse would it justify research??????

I feel very strongly abot this and think rubber poles/ bendy poles shuld be used XC at skinnies etc def at a 4* comp!!
 
I can assure you they def bounce and ping about and are quite harmeless!
When I was little (around 9) and was at ski school me and a mate accidently got off the wrong slope so had to ski down to meet the rest of the class and teacher
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So we skiid down in as much control as possible and all was fine until my friends lost control and decided to grap the side ski pole flag. It ended up pinging up into the sky and landing in the middle of the ski slope
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So I'm sure if they use the same thing there shouldn't be a problem! It would just ping off and land amongst the crowd
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If it was your horse would it justify research??????

I feel very strongly abot this and think rubber poles/ bendy poles shuld be used XC at skinnies etc def at a 4* comp!!

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I agree.
 
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If it was your horse would it justify research??????

I feel very strongly abot this and think rubber poles/ bendy poles shuld be used XC at skinnies etc def at a 4* comp!!

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I agree.

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That's what my unhorsey OH keeps saying. I totally agree.
 
Holly I agree, but have never ever heard of this happening before so would never have occured to me! But you are right, once is enough and in the scheme of things this would be the smallest change xx
 
It was an accident waiting to happen, just like fence posts that are left long (where people don't saw the top off to the level of the field fence). We all know how accident prone our nags are!
 
It was a freak accident, we all agree on that.

We learn from mistakes of the past and most health and safety initiatives comes from lessons learnt from previous accidents. I am gutted for the loss of an amazing, honest horse who took my breath away watching him jump but if another horses life is saved in the future by his death then it will not be a waste. (I wish the owners and the rider all the hugs and best wishes to get them through this terrible time).


I am quite shocked that they have had wooden poles in the first place when most events are swapping to safer options. I can not underestimate how dangerous a flag or something consider inconsequential can be.

When I went white water rafting the instructor told me that even though we was going down one of the hairiest rivers in Canada with plenty of opportunities to be splattered on to rocks, the most dangerous thing for your health was you oar! I dismissed that as pish posh considering what we were going up against.....


I was seated at the front and we hit a swell which knocked the front of the boat and myself up- at which point I whacked my face with the oar and burst my face open nearly knocking myself out and losing a fair deal of blood.
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I learnt my lesson then, I hope Badminton gets its act together.
 
Lessons must be learnt and the sport must move forward. It is a risk sport, that is why we love it. However as riders/owners/trainers we must do all we can to reduce the risk of fatality.
 
I am hoping that BE's association with Goodyear will produce a quick and usable option on this. They seem an ideal partnership in inventing rubber/flexible flagpoles.
 
I was there, it was so awful. Those who were there, did you think it took a long time for the judges/stewards to react to us all srceaming for a vet?

It was definately a wooden flag, as someone picked it up and it had splintered etc. BE are trying to keep the horses saftey in mind, so why has no one ever thought of this?! well maybe they have but i would have thought that badmiton would have the best saftey ever!

it is aso very sad about skwal. RIP both horses and my thoughts are with the owners/riders/grooms etc.
 
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