Horses Running Free in Central London

[Melontree]

I just saw this breaking piece. One of the horses is bleeding/has blood on it. They're both saddled and bridled - I can't imagine what's happened here. I'm sure there'll be an explanation at some point, but I truly hope the horses and riders are okay.

Anyone in the area seen/heard anything?

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/apr/24/horses-on-loose-central-london

Yes I thought the same.

This was absolutely shocking! I can't imagine how the poor horses felt, obviously terrified & the poor riders too! The passerbys who went to the horses assistance are to be commended too, I'm not sure I'd have been that brave tbh? A n ex of mine was part of The Household Cavalry a few years ago & he was thrown from his horse during some parade thing, broke his collarbone & shoulder & he was in excruciating pain for ages, it could have been way worse though, they're huge horses!

Re shooting the cow.
i know a firefighter. They were trying to get 2 cows out of a canal (don’t know how they got there )
took a 5 hour job, person I know got a massive bruise on his leg, his colleague less fortunate with a broken leg

farmer was bloody lucky they got them out alive and fire fighters got injured at the end. Otherwise they’d have been shot.

sometimes not a lot can be done for large animals who don’t understand humans want to help

It is bloody awful!

Cruelty is never acceptable.

I found it incredibly upsetting that no one in the papers even mentioned the state of that poor grey . He must have been blind with panic , poor thing . My daughter did a search online to try and find a bit more news on the horses , on horse and hound they said that one of the horses was in surgery ( I presume the grey ) and that the Whitakers had offered their support, which is such good news , in case they might not be able to return to duty . Apparently one of them spooked at very loud construction noise and unseated his rider , which spooked the other horses . I think one of the riders was hurt pretty badly as he was on the floor for 30 min until the ambulance arrived . Apparently they were not wearing any protection, which I find baffling , both my daughters wear their air jackets even whist only doing flat work , certainly when jumping . Take all the above with a grain of salt as it’s all taken from internet searches , I have no idea of its veracity.

Glad that the horses were caught and appear to be ok, hoping the same for the injured people. The stupidest thing you can do is try to stand in front of a loose horse - there's only going to be one winner in that situation!

I work in Newmarket (home of horseracing), with over 2,000 horses in training in the town you quickly learn to tell the difference between the sound of a controlled trot coming up the road and the rattle of hooves often accompanied by the shouts of "loose one!"

Follow Life of Bean on Twitter/Instagram to get an insight of what it is like on the gallops daily.

https://x.com/LifeOfBean/status/1777395023740334198

I wonder if the horses may have been new to the Household Cavalry & were being trained.
I do know that the horses are right characters off duty & have a very strong bond with their rider.

Did you know that the horses get holidays too so they can relax & just chill out being a horse.
They go to Leicestershire & Norfolk.
In Norfolk they get to go on the beach.

Oh good, you've proven the rule right that no matter how awful a situation, there's always one person who can find fodder for a political joke. 😒

I do hope riders and horses recover quickly.
I'd have been utterly terrified seeing horses galloping towards me.
I'm nervous around horses but think they are magnificent animals.

A man near us had a collie cross he said never needed a lead, as he wouldn't do anything without the owner's say so.

Poor dog was killed crossing an 'A' road near his home.

Another purebred Border Collie was being walked by a man after the dog's owner died- the Collie was walking up an alleyway but took off and ran into traffic.

I so often see off lead dogs on pavements- it's sheer arrogance on the part of the owner- the local veterinary hospital say it's always the so say ''well trained'' ones that bolt into traffic.

Trying to catch a bolting horse is hard- reaching for a flying rein is a sure fire way to make the horse spill your arm out of it's socket plus injure it's mouth-

This is an old video, but it shows how horses react when one bolts.

The idiotic screaming and whoooooooping and waving of arms does nothing productive.
The bolting horse wants to join his mates in the middle of the arena..it's carnage.

Oh no......I hope to goodness not the Grey....He was cantering and obviously lame, bless him. Adrenaline can make them be able to run with serious injuries.

Awful...I'd heard a household cavalry report that all horses were safe ??
{Report given by Officer}

Hopefully report of euthanised horse is just heresay.

FFS. 🙄

@Cesarina to answer your question, my friend used to be a firearms officer. After the cow incident, I asked him that exact question. He answered that a special gun is needed to shoot a cow which most forces won't just have lying around. As it happens, he used to work in an area which had regular cattle markets so they did have one at hand as unfortunately sometimes cows would escape 😕.

I really can’t fathom your motive for posting bollocks like this.

Lucky that no human was killed. Unfair on the public and unfair on the animals. Horses are not suited to an urban city environment. But they are ceremonial, and we must have our pageants.

I regularly see them on Chelsea Embankment early morning and one time a rider-less horse bolted. I don't know what spooked it, lots of traffic around but no loud unexpected noise. The horse went off at speed up a side street.

So I don't think something that we're not privy to happened today.

That newsreader has the only qualification that seems to matter to the BBC these days.

Many years ago my father ran a business doing horse drawn carriage rides from the hall where we lived to the pub that he part owned and back to the hall. There were several horses and carriages and some of the horses were kept in the Meadow next to the pub.
One night no one knows how, one of the horses got out of the meadow in the middle of the night trotted up the High Street and four miles back to the Stables at the hall. No one knew until the girl grooms got up the next morning and found the horse in the stable yard...
Several people did enquire in the next few days why they had heard a horse in the middle of the night and thought they had been dreaming!!

much of what’s on the interweb is false

You need a bolt gun.

@Eve yes that's the one he said.