28 December 2007

Horse rescued by highways agency traffic officers

A Highways Agency Traffic Officer has used her lifelong experience of dealing with horses to help a stranded mare close to the M25 in Essex.

Traffic Officers were called to an incident where a horse was trapped in a river on land adjacent to the anti-clockwise carriageway of the M25 between Junction 28 and 27. Having heard the call on her radio, Traffic Officer Laura Martin knew that her years of rearing and riding horses would be a valuable asset.

Laura and her crew partner Laurence Brighty arrived on scene to find the elderly horse trapped in water up to her neck. While Laura and Laurence worked to calm her, their control room colleagues called the RSPCA and made attempts to locate the landowner and their vets.

Laura, who is based at the Highway's Agency's Whittlesford Outstation, said:

"Horses are easily scared so I knew my experience of handling them would help. They can sense if people they are familiar with are worried so I was able to provide support without adding undue distress.

"Due to the length of time that the horse had been in the water she was close to giving up and was relying on Laurence and myself to support her head.

"Ourselves and a second Traffic Officer crew worked closely with the fire crews, owner and vet to free her from the river as soon as we could. Once the fire service and vet began to remove her from the water, we concentrated on keeping another two horses that were nearby calm, in order to keep the horse in the water from panicking further."

The horse was removed by the fire service with support from a vet just over and hour after the Traffic Officers arrived on scene.

Earlier this year, the Highways Agency signed up to an agreement with the emergency services, RSPCA and International League for the Protection of Horses to deal with incidents involving horses on the motorway network.