First Jumps Racing Horse Death of 2016: RIP Fieldmaster

Posted on 28 April 2016 at 9:44AM by PETA Australia

Yesterday, at Cranbourne’s jumps racing trial in Victoria, Fieldmaster became the first horse of the 2016 jumps racing season to die.

The Coalition for the Protection of Racehorses were there to capture the events as they unfolded, as this heartbreaking video shows:

Fieldmaster sustained a leg injury shortly after jumping over the third-to-last hurdle. As seen in the video, officials then hurried to hide him from the public behind a green screen, as it became apparent that his injury was significant.

After being euthanised on the racetrack and falling lifelessly to the ground, Fieldmaster was covered with a tarp and taken away on a tractor – his body to be disposed of, now that he’s no longer “useful” to the racing industry.

Jumps Racing: Dangerous and Deceitful

Jumps racing has already been banned in New South Wales since 1997. No other state continues to allow jumps racing events to take place except Victoria and South Australia.

In this type of racing, horses are forced to clear metre-high obstacles whilst running at breakneck speed. The risk to horses is high, and the fatalities continue, despite assurances from governing bodies that the industry will address the issue.

Many horses sustain life-ending injuries from clipping the jumps at high speed – even if they don’t fall.

A photo posted by Horse Racing Kills (@horseracingkills) on Jul 11, 2014 at 10:47pm PDT

Serious concerns have been raised about the issue of jumps racing for many years, but the industry continues to downplay the dangers and to put horses at risk for the sake of profits. As far back as 1991, the Senate Select Committee on Animal Welfare expressed concern about the danger of jumps racing, stating:

The Committee has serious concerns about the welfare of horses participating in jump races. These concerns are based on the significant probability of a horse suffering serious injury or even death as a result of participating in these events.