Charity owner’s horror as horses run loose
Escaping animals suffer life-threatening injuries
ACHARITY owner saw her ‘absolute worst fears realised’ when seven racehorses escaped through an open gate and ran onto the road.
She said it was a miracle that no people were injured as a result, but several of her horses have suffered lifethreatening injuries from the ordeal.
Jacqui Taylor went through “45 minutes of hell” trying to bring her horses, one of which used to belong to Sir Alex Ferguson, back to safety and chased them for around six miles.
The Pastures New charity founder was blown away by the help of her fellow Littleborough residents, some of whom even ran out of a hairdressers to form a human chain to block the animals.
Three of Jacqui’s own horses, along with four that are part of the charity which retrains former racehorses, escaped last Saturday, though she does not yet know exactly how.
Jacqui, 57, who runs the charity mostly on her own, said the moment she realised that was happening was “sheer panic, absolute panic” as the seven horses set off for the village at speed.
“In that situation they revert back to being racehorses and they just run,” she said.
“It’s hard to remove that from their past.
“There are often people on the lane.
“When you start to think about what could have happened if some children had been walking past or someone on a bike or someone with headphones in - it’s nothing short of a miracle that no-one was hurt. It could have been so much worse.
“We could have had people injured as well as horses and that does not bear thinking about.”
She chased them in her car in a desperate attempt to save the animals’ lives and keep people safe.
While she drove, her neighbour put out a desperate appeal on a local Facebook group for help.
The mother-of-one had to follow her horses as closely as possible, trying to warn other drivers to stay out of the way, before she was able to get in front and try to slow them down.
When one of the group ‘stopped dead’ she was able to bundle it into a nearby field. While the others were out of sight, she believes they must have all fallen over as when she next saw them at The Rake, on Blackstone Edge Road, they had all stopped.
“By the time we got to The Rake there were loads of people there with cars and horse boxes,” she said.
“The wonderful people of Littleborough helped.
“We had them within 45 minutes - 45 minutes of hell. It was an amazing show by the people and the community. It was just unbelievable.
“Even the ladies in The Image Warehouse hairdressers came out and made a human barrier and joined hands to stop the horses passing them.”
Some parked their cars across the road to block the horses’ path, while others herded and kept an eye on them until Jacqui could pick them up.
When she was finally able to return to the farm there were even more people gathered, though it did look like a ‘war zone,’ particularly when the ‘first responders’ showed up to treat the injured animals.
She has had to close her 25-acre site, which houses both Pastures New and Lane Foot Petting Farm, to visitors this week.
Although she’s paid around £2,000 in medical bills just for her own three horses so far, she hopes the others won’t be as bad.
As well as helping on the day, members of the local community have been contributing money to help the charity cover the costs by donating at the Pastures New website.
Jacqui said: “It’s pretty dramatic how we will be affected financially. We are not the sort of charity that has money to fall back on. There’s mostly just me here nine times out of ten.
“They will require rehabilitation and therapy. The vet is coming to check wounds and for infection every day. There’s a lot of legs to look at - there’s 28 legs to consider.”
Some of the animals suffered nerve damage, deep lacerations and jarred joints - while all will be in pain for days as a result of running around six miles on hard tarmac, their equivalent of a ‘marathon.’ Some are still facing a battle for survival.
Though Jacqui didn’t see anyone leave the gate open, walkers have been guilty of doing so three times in the past as a footpath runs through her field.
On each previous occasion, the horses have been caught before they could get very far. She hopes walkers will always close gates behind them when in the country.
“This has always, always been my absolute worst fear,” she said.
“My worst fear has now been realised.
“It can happen in a split second - there needs to be greater awareness. There’s always horses out on Starring Way because of people leaving gates open but those are not like our horses.
“They only go out and eat the rosebushes, whereas ours were born to run.”