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Cheshire firecrews work for an hour to free horse trapped in box on M6

accident on M6

Amy Mathieson, H&H news writer

7 January, 2009

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Firefighters in Cheshire worked for over an hour to free a horse that was trapped in a horsebox on a motorway.

The horse was stuck for more than hour on Sunday (4 January) after it was involved in a crash on the M6.

The crash happened at about 1.20pm between junction 22 (Winwick) and junction 21a (Croft interchange).

The motorway was closed in both directions while firecrews rescued the horse.

A spokesman for Cheshire Fire and Rescue told H&H: “ We can not confirm exactly how the crash occurred but during the incident the horsebox was tipped over, trapping a horse inside.

“The horse was badly bruised but had no broken bones.

“When firecrews arrived the horsebox was on its side and had a central partition in, even though there was only one horse travelling in the box — making it difficult to access the animal.”

A vet was called to sedate the horse before it could be removed.

The spokesman added: “We tried to pull the horse out but it was not working so the central partition was removed — which was cumbersome and heavy.

“It was lucky that it was not a skittish horse as we were able to remove it quite calmly once sedated.

“When the second horsebox arrived to collect the horse, it understandably was nervous and wouldn’t load so a section of motorway fencing was removed and the horse was led into an adjacent field to calm it down before it was taken home.”


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