Hartpury Horse Trials Horse Hit By a Car

Cedars

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Post about it on e venting. Think more car hit by horse and rider! Tom Rowland riding. Both walked away apparently, but.....
 

snooples

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Read this too on e-venting, car driving on course! I read it as they galloped into the car but Im probably wrong!
 

teapot

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Post about it on e venting. Think more car hit by horse and rider! Tom Rowland riding. Both walked away apparently, but.....

A moving car shouldn't be that close to a moving horse & rider on a xc course so not sure you can imply it was the rider's fault...

Plus for those who have seen his tweets since (ie from the horse's mouth if you excuse the pun) well it makes for interesting reading! They're bruised but ok thankfully.
 
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teapot

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The fact that you wrote 'more car hit by horse and rider' which could be read as though it was one person's fault over another. On the other hand, I can see why you wrote if it's in reference to the thread title!

Sorry for offending but just the tone came across differently :)
 

Merlotmonster

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I was there today and saw this. Car went to cross the course just as the horse was galloping past. It did stop but not in time and the horse hit the wing and wing mirror throwing the rider off! Thankfully both were ok. A woman then went hysterical and was shouting and ( so I overheard over the event radio) hit her!! The driver was very upset.
 

Merlotmonster

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Yes, think it may have been his mother.. It was a tad of an over reaction in my mind, as Both were on their feet and it was clearly an accident, but I guess people act differently when in shock. Horrible for all concerned and just glad all ok.
 

Lolo

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Yes, think it may have been his mother.. It was a tad of an over reaction in my mind, as Both were on their feet and it was clearly an accident, but I guess people act differently when in shock. Horrible for all concerned and just glad all ok.

To be fair, her son on a horse had just hit a car hard enough to necessitate medical care. When they were travelling at speed, had total right of way and shouldn't have needed to be thinking "I wonder if there are any careless drivers on this XC course?". If I were the lady driving the car, I'd be fairly grateful the mother stopped at just that.

Hope both horse and rider are alright today. What a horrible incident.
 

Kiribati_uk

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To be fair, her son on a horse had just hit a car hard enough to necessitate medical care. When they were travelling at speed, had total right of way and shouldn't have needed to be thinking "I wonder if there are any careless drivers on this XC course?". If I were the lady driving the car, I'd be fairly grateful the mother stopped at just that.

Hope both horse and rider are alright today. What a horrible incident.

Totally agree it was an accident but it should never of been allowed to happen, surely crossing points are manned with stewards, so they should close crossing when horse coming?? ......As for Toms mom hitting driver that I would of done the same, to watch your son and horse get hit by a car must be awful, eventing is tough enough without crap like this happening. Also glad girl who got airlifted out in the 1star was discharged form hospital last night.
 

Cedars

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It is nothing short of a miracle that the horse didn't break something. I can't even imagine how scary that must have been for Tom.

I agree though, assault never justified. Would she have hit a fence judge if they'd had a nasty fall at a tricky fence? You'd hope not but..!

I would imagine there will be legal implications? So this won't be the end of the story.
 

MistletoeMegan

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Whilst I absolutely don't agree with violence, I can absolutely understand the level of emotion felt by the woman. I was thinking about this last night, and if that had been my horse & rider that had been hit, after the initial relief that they were alright I'd be absolutely fuming too and would want someone's head on a plate (although I'd be satisfied with this only being in a metaphorical sense ;) ).

This incident could easily have had a very different outcome and it needs reviewing to stop it from ever happening again (I still can't quite believe it happened in the first place!). If the suggested identity of the driver is correct then I understand why said person needed to cross the course and that may also explain if there was any element of rushing. But I don't understand how you get from that to being able to cross the course right in front of a horse and not see a horse galloping towards the car.

Eventers have quite enough risks to try to mitigate themselves without having something like this too. Hopefully this incident is reviewed in sufficient detail and with the appropriate seriousness given how easily it could have resulted in serious injury or worse. I don't doubt that the driver is feeling horrendous, but something needs to be done to ensure that this is only ever a one-off incident.
 

Cedars

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I don't think it's a massive leap - I've been at (much much much!) smaller events where particular fences are causing chaos for whatever reason, and when you stand in the lorry park or on the course you hear all sorts of obscenities and threats of complaining and making sure people know what's what, when their horse/rider goes A over T and the person deems it not to be their responsibility.

I agree though, totally different in that the guilt in the situation is completely and entirely hers - and as I think I said above, I would be in extremely serious discussions this morning. I just don't understand how it could even happen.

I didn't attend but those who did said there wasn't all too much whistle blowing going on - stewarding 'not fantastic' as it was put in a text - however whistles wouldn't have affected a car anyway.

I hope the horse is still as fine this morning as it seemed yesterday. And Tom, obviously!
 

ester

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I think it's a huge leap, the fence judge is not in charge of the fence or what it does. The driver of a car very much is!
 

MistletoeMegan

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I think it's a huge leap, the fence judge is not in charge of the fence or what it does. The driver of a car very much is!

Absolutely this. I'm a struggling to comprehend how you don't see the clear and distinct difference Cedars, and why you think it's acceptable to suggest it.
 

Firewell

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It sounds to me like a horrid accident, no one would have meant it to happen. Event director was probably flying around like a headless chicken trying to make sure everything was running smoothly for the competitiors and helpers and everyone else. Rider was simply doing what they had gone there to do. Yes event director shouldn't have been careless, no the mum probably shouldn't have tried to hit her but no one was hurt.
I can see it from all sides, rider really upset that himself and his horse could have been hurt, mum who saw her son potentially about to be seriously hurt, event director horrified that she had just hit a horse. It's happened now it's time to move on and not let it happen again.
 

Caledonia

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This cannot just be 'moved on' from - it's astounding that neither the horse nor rider was killed. However harassed she was, driving across the course when the horses are running without looking is unbelievable. There is a dent in the landrover as if it had hit a wall, apparently. How do you think the horse is feeling now?

I believe there is to be a full enquiry and rightly so. She has double responsibility, as ensuring crossing are manned is presumably within her remit as event director.
 

TableDancer

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It was not, in fact, the Event Director/Organiser, who is Philip Cheetham. TR has admitted his mistake in terms of identifying the individual involved. It was a "very high level" BE official - female, you don't need a degree to work out who. And in fairness, it is not that she did not look, it is that she mistakenly looked the wrong way. It is absolutely right that an enquiry should be held as this is an accident hich should never have happened. I'm sure the driver, who is clearly in the wrong, feels absolutely terrible. Nonetheless, it was obviously a terrible mistake and personally I feel we should not be too quick to judge - those who have never, ever made a genuine error which could have ended in tragedy may beg to differ, but I suspect there arn't too many of those people if truth be told.

It seems to me that, rather than vilifying an individual who clearly never intended harm, we should be looking at the bigger picture to ensure it can't happen again, as human beings are just that and will always make mistakes from time to time. There need to be failsafe mechanisms in place - why wasn't the crossing manned with a steward and if it was, why didn't they stop the vehicle? After all, if it had been a child on foot, the consequences could have been even worse...
 

Freddie19

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Not necessarily a crossing point, and can I say that it has happened before...both in Ireland and Great Britain. Glad that horse and rider are fine. I am sure person driving vehicle will be having nightmares for some time to come.
 

oldvic

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It was the event director. Philip was the organiser.
As Tabledancer says, we are all human and I am sure that it is the last thing that she wanted to happen. That area of the course is very congested with 2 major crossing points, the 1st water and another influential fence. The crossing was approached round a bend from the water and the area was busy so crossing point stewards should have been essential. When you run too many horses in one day, your human resources are stretched to the limit and they have too long a day. Added to that, the hour hold at 8.30 a.m. increased the pressure that everyone was under and, with additional holds due to broken pins, the horses were having to be started too quickly for comfort. 90 sec intervals maximum for 2 and 3* is too intense especially over a prolonged period - in excess of 7 hours. Pippa was possibly a victim of this as the fence judge at the 2nd water didn't have time to replace the red flag and her horse jumped around the edge of the fence. The flag could have helped to keep him in. She was 40 secs behind the previous horse.
Tom's incident must be prevented in future. Maybe the FEI will have to restrict the number of runners in one day to allow time for things to be done properly.
 

TableDancer

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It was the event director. Philip was the organiser.
As Tabledancer says, we are all human and I am sure that it is the last thing that she wanted to happen. That area of the course is very congested with 2 major crossing points, the 1st water and another influential fence. The crossing was approached round a bend from the water and the area was busy so crossing point stewards should have been essential. When
Tom's incident must be prevented in future. Maybe the FEI will have to restrict the number of runners in one day to allow time for things to be done properly.

Thank you for clarifying, I'm afraid I've been given duff information which I should have checked.

I agree re starters it sounds like a nightmare for XC officials - I wondered, do you know why they ran the 3* XC yesterday rather than leaving it till Sunday like they used to? Is it the first year they have done it this way?
 
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