Call to action over rider deaths.

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ninab

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Thank you to Horse and Hound for publishing my letter this week, please read it, share it and express your views.

As I have said in my letter, I do not profess to have any answers but I feel very strongly indeed that something serious needs to be done in the sport of eventing.

Death in our sport is unacceptable.

Sir - During the period between 2006 and 2008, 18 riders died whilst eventing, mostly due to the 'rotational fall'. What has happened since then? Various enquiries & the birth of the 'frangible pin', but no real action plan. Yesterday in the aftermath of a series of serious accidents, and the tragic death of Tom Gadsby, I read an article (H&H News, 29th August) , where HSI Chairman Patrick Wall states 'It is not acceptable that people are killed participating in the sport they love when all preventable initiatives have not been exhausted.' I agree. In response, BE and the FEI state that they are 'committed to exploring ways of further improving safety'. In my opinion, this is not enough, and fundamental questions need to be answered. Are course builders regulated enough? Can XC fences be made safer soon and how? Are professional riders pushing horses to levels they are not capable of and are owners coercing them to do so? Is a £400 air jacket really too expensive to justify in comparison to the safety benefit? Have riders really thought about how technical XC courses have become at every level and how good a jumper they need to be sat on?
I do not have the answers, I just know that it is NOT OK in the aftermath of a tragedy to be satisfied with numerous social media tributes, and an unquantified statement from BE that the statistical risk of death/serious injury has 'decreased significantly' in the last 10 years. Really?

Nina Barbour
Bolesworth, Cheshire
 
eventing is a very high risk sport. Im not sure how you can completely negate that risk. It seems to me that safety issues are being addressed as much as they possibly can but at the end of the day its never going to be 100% safe due to the nature of the sport its self.. I agree air jackets could do more to be cheaper, and thus more accessible to amateur and grass roots riders. However it is the nature of commerce that manufactures want to achieve as high a retail price for their product they can get, so it's very difficult to pressure them to make a product cheaper.

what would YOU like to see done?
 
I do believe if BE say the statistical risk has reduced it has .
I would love to see the figures published on a regular basis and see it broken down for each level .
A statistical reduction means not a lot if say you have loads more competitors at 90 and most deaths are at I and above but statistical average is being pulled down by lots of rounds at the lower levels .
I am not qualified to say what statistical benefit air jackets are giving but if BE have the data they should publish it .
BE have got their training system much better than it was I applaud that and urge them to contine their efforts particularily in the XC training area .
 
While one one hand i do agree, however there is no way our sport could ever be deemed "safe" we are entrusting our lives to a prey animal with a mind of its own, i believe just as many serious accidents and deaths occour to riders at home, hacking schooling training so for these accidents no governing body can make a differance. I do think that as riders it is OUR responsability to ensure we are as safe as humanly possible - ie. Body protector, air vest, good safe to standard hat, suitable horse and at correct level of fitttnes/ training. We just need to understand the risks and make our own decision as to if somethink is safe enough for us to take part. If we have taken all reasonable precautions and know the risk and still continue then we should just be able to enjoy our sport.
It should be down to Rider Responsability our safety is in our hands!
 
Although I agree the deaths are very sad.
I do believe a lot has been done and they are continuing to work on making the sport safer.

However it is a high risk sport and I don't think it can be made 100% safe.
 
I personally think that all things considered BE and the course builders do an excellent job in doing all practically possible in keeping safety paramount. Riders must take some rsponsibility for their own safety too - wearing suitable air vests, making sure the horse is fit and capable and also that they have the ability to ride the track they have just walked. Many sports are dangerous and result in tragic deaths, none so more than National Hunt Racing, but also skiing, diving, sailing, rugby to name a few. I am actually against the 'dumbing down' (probably not the right expression) of challenges in any sport for health and safety reasons. Tragic as Tom's early death was - he had NOT taken every precaution available to him in mitigating his own personal safety. As I am sure you are aware, some riders have many many rides in one day at the same event - perhaps that should be restricted in case the rider gets tired and the judgement is impaired ? Just an idea - what do you think ?
You did ask for views, so hope OP you accept this in the spirit of your question, which is you simply stating 'something must be done' and 'it's dangerous' (the gist of your letter)but not knowing what, is a bit of a pointless exercise. Sorry. if you or your loved ones find it too dangerous, then your prerogative is to give up making a living from it. One mans danger is another excitement - just like the other sports mentioned.
 
i have never done eventing at any level, so am spectacularly unqualified to comment, but I agree with the OP. In this day and age, where gigantic sums of money are passed around TV companies and made from companies cashing in on Olympic successes etcetera, to accept a death toll when there are still measures that could be taken to prevent more of them, is wrong. Surely with the technologies that we have available to us as a human race, we could find a way to make these fences more collapsible. I understand that those who do the sport are willing to accept the risks, but surely they can be reduced through some sensible measures.
 
The problem is finding a trend amongst the accidents where people die/ are seriously injured. Frangible pins tackle the most common sort- leaving a leg over an upright which then causes a rotational and they have certainly worked very well.
The more recent falls seem to have been at relatively straightforward fences which werent viewed as being classic fall fences?
Air jackets I'm not totally sold on. Exos definitely- cant understand why they have not been more widely used
 
In terms of collapsible fences this is a serious bit of engineering and exceptionally long term to safely design, test and finally implement.

It's not a case of not caring, it's another ten years of work ahead before they're commonplace...
 
While I am sorry as you are that people have died doing what they love and the deaths are tragic, I don't think you are adding anything (other than a note of mild hysteria) to the safety debate which has been ongoing for quite a while now. You don't seem to be very well informed on why the accidents happened, what has already been done to make things safer or what might be done in the future. Asking rhetorical questions is the easy bit...
 
I evented at Novice level for several years for the sheer adrenalin rush of it. I'm sure I wasn't alone in that and that many people are doing the same now. I was in fact the first person ever to compete over the fence that I have been told killed poor Tom. If nobody was ever badly hurt, or died, the sport would not hold the same thrill, not generate the same level of adrenaline, and would not have been a sport which I would have chosen to do.

I honestly think that if eventing could be made safe, it would not then be eventing.
 
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I have to agree with the poster who has asked what you are actually trying to achieve with your letter/post? And I also agree with the comment that it smacks of mild hysteria.

So seriously OP what do you want changed? What can BE & riders do to make it safer.
The sport has got safer & there have been advancements in safety wear - hats, body protectors, air jackets.

Personally I would like to see further testing on air jackets with the results transparent & visible for all. We can't currently put a degree on how much they are helping in bad falls because we are only getting anecdotes.

I think BE should have a 'library' of safety equipment that people who want to do research can borrow. If a company wants their equipment to be used at BE then they should donate to this research library.

I would like to see a database accesible to all of every fall that occurs, level, fence type, type of fall, any injuries that occurred & what safety wear the rider was wearing. This opens up the opportunity for more research, & not just from BE but as part of degree/masters courses.

The long & short is that horse riding is dangerous. Only a month ago a young girl was killed after an accident out hacking....this didn't cause hysterical letters to H&H demanding increased safety [shrug]
 
I don't think the size/bulk/structure/etc. of xc fences should be blamed nor majorly altered from the traditional style (i'm not saying that safety precautions should be ignored) and tragic as deaths are (and no disrespect meant) but if you looked at the number of rounds of xc done at all levels of riding and then look at the number of deaths caused by this you will probably find it a million to one (i know this is not accurate but in simplicity this is how it is)...furthermore i think any size/type of fence can cause an equally serious injury or death eg. i am awarethat a rider was killed in a fall around a 2'3 sj course a while bac ( i now no specifics but it was briefly brought up in an instructors training day in the health and safety section)...you will probably find there were no more deaths in the 'olden days' of eventing than there will evere be with all the dumbing down of a the future....

I quote princess Anne 'every horse has the capacity to kill wherever they are on your side or not'
 
I think the other thing to remember that horse riding is an inherently dangerous sport. Whether you're a happy hacker or a top level eventer, you get on a horse and you're putting yourself in danger. As an adult, it is up to you to decide upon how to manage that.

If XC is unsafe in your opinion, don't go. If you want to, weigh up how dangerous it is against how much you want to do it and how much you can mitigate your risk. But my mum works in A&E and she comes home with far more tales of riders falling off out hacking and injuring themselves, or working in the school, than those who are going XC and similar.

It is rider responsibility to acknowledge those risks and then to work out how to manage them. Someone getting on a horse thinking it is a safe hobby at any level is a danger: taking the responsibility of acknowledging this danger with further rules about protective gear is, in my opinion, not hitting the mark.

In racing currently, they are working on a project that will see the introduction of a collapsible fence. This is 5 years in and still ongoing as a project with very slow progress- it has teams of mechanical and civil engineering 3rd year students from my uni working on it and having seen the work, it is exceptionally complex. I don't think people understand the huge amount of modelling, computer analysis and engineering knowledge about how the ground acts under different pressures and forces that is needed to create the fences they are after. Frangible pins look simple but they aren't by a long shot, and they are the easiest method of fence-safety there is really.
 
I would suggest that a British Standard is developed for the testing of Cross Country Jumps. This means that their entire construction could be evaluated using a scientific basis and experts in all the spheres associated with protecting the human body could be invited to join the working group to develop a standard.

British Standards have been used for the development of a British Standard for the testing of Crash Hats and Back Protectors both of which have proved to be beneficial to the safety of horse riders.
 
But how, OrangePepper? There is no one type of fence which causes a rotational, and no one type of approach. I think in all honesty if a horse has started to rotate, unless the fence collapses totally and the horse is lucky (and I think a fence with an open profile, like a oxer made of rails rather than an oxer which is a log pile is also your best bet...) the rotational is still likely to happen. Unless the fence starts to collapse to totally flat as soon as the horse hits it, before the back end can come up (and realistically the back end will come up before the horse hits the fence hard) then the mechanics of the fall are in place. You're just lessening the height of it and therefore hopefully the projectory of the horse will be sideways rather than over...

Also, British Standards are fading. We'd need a European standard: we don't use BS anymore for most new construction purposes which XC fences fall under.

What needs regulating IMO: how people move up the levels and how fences are fixed. Beyond that, I think it is truly luck in what happens on the day.
 
Ok been along time since i evented but still follow it. safety as become more and more evident over the years but the sport will never be "safe" given the nature of it. And then you must ask self if it is so unsafe why to so many take part week in week out not just here but world wide? Why is it so popular why do so many yearn to do it. yes lets push toward airjackets more affordable lets keep striving to keep horse and rider safe but water it down to much ? what would that do sport horses in general are dangerous riding in general is dangerous . We has riders have to play our part in safety to. knowledge fit horses proper training. to water down to much would kill a sport enjoyed by thousands and whilst any death is dreadful and sad they were doing something they loved and not forced to do
 
The OP's post reminds me of a few editorials that were floating around the news this winter after a few people tragically died in avalanches in the Scottish mountains. The writers demanded that "something" be done to make the mountains safer.

Mountaineering, like eventing or any sort of horseback riding, is a high risk sport. Participants probably know this. Making it perfectly safe would be (a) impossible and (b) take away something that draws a lot of people to these sports. When you go into the mountains, especially in winter, you know that your safety and survival depends on your ability to read conditions and make fast decisions in the moment, based on what you see and what's happening around you. This is one of the reasons people do it in the first place.
 
Whilst you could apply a British Safety Standard to the construction of a XC fence I don't think this will have that much effect on actual course safety.

What can't be taken into account is the positioning, siting & dressing of the fence...all of these have a huge impact on the safety of a jump & also what makes XC, XC! A skinny brush on the flat is a much different question to exactly the same skinny brush at the bottom of a hill or after a drop fence.

Examples being :
The fence where Ian Olding fell & was killed. It was thought afterwards that the dressing of the fence with models of people may have contributed to the horse falling.
Phoebe Buckley suffered a rotational fall with Little Tiger (both got up fine & Phoebe wasn't wearing an air jacket) at a double of houses. On a video on her website Phoebe says that she felt it was caused by the undulating ground around the fence.
 
erm just another thought...

al this talk about collapsible fences that give way etc.....wasn't it only a few months ago that there was the whole issue with fences not being completely secure and therefore dangrous???

I'm sorry but IMO if your gonna make collapsible fences you might aswell have them jumping over cardboard boxes
 
LittleRocketRider said:
erm just another thought...

al this talk about collapsible fences that give way etc.....wasn't it only a few months ago that there was the whole issue with fences not being completely secure and therefore dangrous???

I'm sorry but IMO if your gonna make collapsible fences you might aswell have them jumping over cardboard boxes
Click to expand...

The fuss was over unfixed fences: fences that move forwards with the horse. A collapsible fence would be one where the base remains in the same position (this is really difficult) but the fence folds down to that base. This is a pretty safe thing to happen because the horse should sprawl rather than tip. An unfixed fence the base moves, and this means the horse can be tangled up in it and still tip.

To be honest, the only collapsible fences I've heard of are for racing and are hurdles. The likelihood of them being moved over to XC successfully is tiny. Because if you wanted to jump a course of brushes you'd go hurdling... Which takes us back to risk management: you ride round a course, you accept there's risk and you still do it.
 
Of course it is dreadful when any fatality occurs in equine sport but it is a risk that you cannot eliminate. Sure, we can try and make as safe as possible but even the most experienced horse can make a mistake when excited, adrenalin racing or from a momentary lapse in concentration. X country is a challenge to horse and rider - that's the whole point of the discipline! I team chase and I love the sport (as does my horse) - I'm well aware of the risks but it's my choice to participate. In all honesty, despite taking part in a high risk sport, I'm probably still more likely to be killed in a car accident or from a critical illness

You don't have to event/team chase/x country to be at risk - half tonne of horse v's 8.5 stone of human - do the math. I've read on this site fairly recently of a young girl fatally kicked in the field and a lady crushed in a horse box. Tragic, freak accidents. If you are around horses you are at risk on some level

I would hate to see the sports we love over regulated and lose the thrill that those of us who participate so enjoy. C'mon I don't get a lot of excitement in life :)
 
The riders know what they're getting into when they choose to go eventing. Any individual who chooses to do eventing obviously knows the risk with it, so its that person's responsibility. Unfortunately death is just the reality of living and risk makes life exciting. You could be killed by crossing the road, but that doesn't mean you stay inside all day. I can guarantee that most eventers love the thrill of eventing. Also, what would be the boundary with making the courses safer? When the jumps aren't bigger than 2ft and are made of cushions?
 
Everything to do with horses carries a risk. I was lucky that the papers the other day didn't carry the story: "Vet killed by 4 week old foal!" Yep - it was one of mine who didn't WANT to be DNA-tested - and as I pulled hairs from her tail she HURLED forward on her hind legs and got the vet in the chest with both front legs and considerable force. If she'd been a bit higher, it would have been his face - and the outcome could have been very nasty!

There is NO practical way of preventing rotational falls unless you stop jumping at speed. BE has done a lot to try and make courses safer - and the riders complain that they're too easy!
 
i think BE etc are doing all they can to make the sport safer and air jackets , better hats and body protectors have also improved over the years
my friend used to event to 4* years ago and she can remember going around badminton in a hat with no chin strap (hats didn't have to be worn at all) and a piece of foam tied around her waist with string as a body protector

short of making the xc fences out of card board i can't see how they could make it completely safe , even then a horse could still stand on a front boot and flip over or fall between fences

the biggest safety issue i think needs sorting out pronto is the lower level competitors , iv'e spent this year doing BE80's and it is shocking what some people consider fit/competent enough to take around a xc course
there was at least 5 horse/rider combinations at each comp (4) that i have been to this year that shouldn't have been allowed to even start the xc due to unbalanced and poor riding , one person fell off in the sj then proceeded to fall off twice round the xc course :( not to mention the welfare implications of some horses being obese and allowed to start

there really is going to be a serious accident at the lower levels if this is not dealt with
 
angelish said:
i think BE etc are doing all they can to make the sport safer and air jackets , better hats and body protectors have also improved over the years
my friend used to event to 4* years ago and she can remember going around badminton in a hat with no chin strap (hats didn't have to be worn at all) and a piece of foam tied around her waist with string as a body protector

short of making the xc fences out of card board i can't see how they could make it completely safe , even then a horse could still stand on a front boot and flip over or fall between fences

the biggest safety issue i think needs sorting out pronto is the lower level competitors , iv'e spent this year doing BE80's and it is shocking what some people consider fit/competent enough to take around a xc course
there was at least 5 horse/rider combinations at each comp (4) that i have been to this year that shouldn't have been allowed to even start the xc due to unbalanced and poor riding , one person fell off in the sj then proceeded to fall off twice round the xc course :( not to mention the welfare implications of some horses being obese and allowed to start

there really is going to be a serious accident at the lower levels if this is not dealt with
Click to expand...

While I agree with your comments .
What does the data say ? that's what needs to out there but such data is often difficult and expensive to produce in a readable form .
BE is training system is so much better than it was they really must keep working and developing this system especially on the XC side .
Making good training available in an approachable way is very very important for those starting with eventing .
I am pretty sure that deaths per round ridden at the lower levels will not be that many .
 
Mmm, am hearing what you're saying OP (and others), but some of us who're a bit long in the tooth can remember a lot of deaths in the hunting field from people falling off........ in those days there wasn't body protectors or specialist riding hats, everyone just wore velvet hunting caps without any harnesses on.

Also Point-to-pointing was the same, lots of falls - and some deaths.

A friend forwarded a YouTube of HRH Princess Anne in 1976 at the Bromont Olympics in Canada doing her cross-country round. No BP, crash-hat primitive to say the least. She took a horrendous fall - and went on to complete the round. But she had been concussed and said afterwards that she couldn't remember completing!!!

So what I'm saying is that eventing in particular, and horse-sports in general, were far more dangerous years ago.

But........ methinks perhaps in those days (and I'm gonna be shot down for this, just feel it:) that horses were maybe better prepared? What I mean is that young/green horses were given a season's cubbing & then hunting proper, and learnt how to deal with all sorts of fences (fixed timber included), and have to find an extra leg on a regular basis, BEFORE being thrown into the cross-country course situation.

And the X-country courses of that period would scare the pants of any horse/rider combination that wasn't properly prepared! You just wouldn't risk it.

Whereas nowadays a lot of horses are way too "precious" (and expensive, lets face it) to be allowed to go hunting, which is still IMO the very best prep any horse, or rider for that matter, could ever have for eventing.
 
Riding, let alone riding at speed over fixed obstacles, is a high risk sport. No one who rides should be unaware of that fact, and no one is forced to do it. Any death is tragic, the death of riders AND horses at events is sad but inevitable - at least the rider has a choice in the matter.
 
Eventing has been more regulated over the years with rules on rider equipment, the level they can compete and the development and understanding of why and how riders are injured. It not perfect but they are trying very hard.
Its a lot for dangerous to ride a bike. 117 deaths in 2011
http://www.rospa.com/roadsafety/adviceandinformation/cycling/facts-figures.aspx
If you cycle in London and your are a women you are even more likely to be killed. http://road.cc/content/news/76510-stats-reveal-londons-deadly-cycling-zone…-if-youre-woman
I get the Evening Standard and it makes me want to cry every time I read someone else has been killed.
There are lots of factors which have lead to this but millions of people take to two wheels with no training, poorly equipped and wearing no protection, and then you fast moving traffic so its no wonder someone gets killed or injured usually the young.
If the OP wants to stop easily avoidable deaths I think a campaign to improve cyclists safety would be a better option. Every time someone gets on a horse its a risk but most times they are wearing a hard hat and have had some training.
 
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