All in a day’s work

Jim Weston shares the emotion of horse rescues — from lightning strikes to swimming pools

Fireman Jim Weston

I genuinely like animals — I have a springer spaniel — but I hadn’t had much insight into horses until about five years ago, when I moved on to the special rescue team for Somerset, based in Bridgwater, where I’m watch manager. We have a higher level of training than a regular firefighter, and being in Somerset, animals make up a big chunk of our work. Large animal rescues are a major operation, due to the risk they pose to humans.

We probably have one horse rescue a week,

though sometimes there’s a spate. Horses stuck in a ditch are the most common scenario. We have various methods for getting a horse out — sometimes it’s as simple as using manpower and strops, sometimes we need to roll them out. The next step is physically lifting them with a Manitou [forklift] borrowed from a farmer, to which we attach a specialist rescue device, which slips off them easily once they’re on dry land.

We’ve had rescues that have really stretched us.

Once a large horsebox had gone over into a ditch with the horse upside down inside, flailing around. Once we’d got the people out safely, we had to work out how to open the box up. Then we sedated the horse, put strops on and pulled it forward — but as that would have put it into a ditch, we laid a special “mud path” over the ditch.

It was a massively dodgy scenario, but happily it had a successful ending. It took an hour, but it felt like forever.

The strangest emergency I attended was after a lightning strike at night.

The lightning had spooked the horse, who’d jumped into a tree and broken his back. We were called to see if we could get him standing with our lifting equipment, but sadly the vets had to put him to sleep. A funnier one was when we assisted with a horse who had walked into the swimming pool through the cover. He wasn’t in danger as he could stand, and we piled up hay bales like steps in the pool so he could walk out. We do whatever works.

Besides the physical rescue,

we are trained in animal behaviour, anatomy and psychology. That has been really insightful. My colleagues joke that I’m a horse whisperer as I enjoy calming them and learning about their characters during a rescue. Sometimes even the owner won’t know how to calm their horse in an emergency situation. I’m always looking for signs — the ears and eyes give away how they are responding. Horses go through cycles of adrenalin rushes and we need to use these to help us — if they suddenly thrash, that short burst of energy can get them out.

It’s just as dangerous rescuing a horse as going into a blazing house

— a kick from a horse is as likely to kill you as smoke from a house fire. We wear a lot of “Personal Protective Equipment”: a sealed drysuit, a helmet and a personal flotation device, which is like padding. We often dress the vets up too — which they like, as they don’t usually get such protection. We also have safety lines so we can pull colleagues out of the situation if it gets dangerous.

It’s very emotional work

— sometimes there’s a bad outcome even when you’ve tried everything. The classic fire service way to deal with it is with black humour. We have some harrowing experiences, but we try to have a laugh afterwards. There’s a strong team ethic, we rely on each other and rally round when someone’s struggling. A warm drink when we get back to the fire station helps — but we might be straight out again to attend a fire.