It's Not Just the Jumps!
For years, the conversation about eventing safety has circled around frangible pins, and how to avoid rotational falls. A new study published in the Equine Veterinary Journal looked at 110 verified horse fatalities in eventing between 1998 and 2023.
Their findings show most of the horse fatalities didn’t happen at a fence. In fact, nearly 63% of the horses that died didn’t fall at all. That alone should shift the conversation.
The causes split evenly between musculoskeletal injuries [broken leg] and sudden death [heart attack].
Become a Sponsor
Buy Me a CoffeeAs many as 90% of the sudden deaths just happened somewhere along the course and not in relation to a fall on a fence.
Horses that looked fine, until they weren’t.
We say we care about horse welfare. We build frangible fences and tweak formats. But maybe it’s time to admit that it’s not just the jump that’s the problem. It’s the sport.
The culture.
The blind spots.
The mentality.
The hunt for MERs...
Similar data in horse racing led to reforms and a drop in fatalities. Eventing? Still shrugging and protecting their precious MIMs and frangible systems.
But if horses are dying mid-course without warning, and we’re still only talking about the fences, what exactly are we protecting? The horses, or the image?
