Here is a happy update. THey had way more applications than there are horses!
By Tara Malone | Tribune staff reporter
10:22 PM CST, November 14, 2007
Surrounded by horses snacking on hay bales, Megan Curran tapped a foot on the straw-matted barn floor and took stock of the animals before her.
Curran, 16, of Salem, Wis., cut out of class early Wednesday and traveled with her parents to north suburban Wadsworth, where more than three dozen horses awaited adoption after surviving a rollover crash last month that fatally injured 18 of at least 59 horses reported to have been in the trailer.
"This is so hard," she whispered to her mother.
Curran ultimately settled on two foals—one a sweetheart and one spirited, she said, and both still nursing wounds from the collision.
They joined the first batch of eight equine survivors to go home with new owners. Three weeks after the accident occurred, at least seven others have been tapped for adoption and will leave in days. The 26 remaining horses will be adopted during the coming weeks, veterinarians and caretakers said.
A Belgian mare whose shoulder was fractured in the collision was euthanized Monday. Others hurt in the crash will require ongoing medical attention for swollen limbs, bruised eyes or cuts, veterinarian Kevin Nelson said.
"I think most will be fine and perfectly usable horses. But it's only been a couple of weeks," Nelson said. "Some of these horses may benefit tremendously from one-on-one care."
Like Curran, all the horse adopters live within 200 miles of Fred and Vicki Carney's Wadsworth farm, where the mix of colts and fillies were taken to recover the night of the Oct. 27 crash. Many, like Curran, volunteered the night of the crash to help at the accident scene.
Dan Kelly spent hours helping to shepherd horses from the tangle of heads and hooves within the overturned trailer. On Wednesday, the Wadsworth man, who owns a pony-riding business, adopted the two Belgian ponies he first spotted as they were led together to safety.
"These guys have made it through quite a journey, I think," Kelly said.
A committee of a dozen veterinarians and horse owners who helped care for the injured animals set parameters for adoption before they sifted the nearly 250 applications that came from as far as Australia, Sweden, Arizona, Florida and Wyoming.
Distance weeded out many, said Donna Ewing, president of the Hooved Animal Rescue and Protection Society. The Barrington-based organization assumed financial responsibility for the surviving horses Tuesday when the owner's insurance company transferred ownership. Inspections of applicants' stable space and interviews with their veterinarians are under way.
"Some of the people who said they wanted them backed out when they saw how much work it would be," Ewing said. "We want to be sure people are sure about what they are getting into."
Because many of the Wadsworth horses now have shipping fever, a contagious respiratory sickness, they initially must be isolated from other horses and animals. The sickness often develops when horses are transported, but, if treated, it should pass within a few weeks, Ewing said.
Every horse medically cleared for adoption comes with a recent health inspection and a blood exam that checks for equine infectious anemia, a sickness that is contagious and fatal. Nelson and other veterinarians who tended to the animals gave new owners records itemizing the care given to horses injured in the accident.
Megan Curran and her parents, Sandy and Michael, received antibiotics and anti-inflammatory medicine to guard against infection in a swollen hind leg of one of their new foals.
"TLC is what she needs, convalescent TLC," Nelson said. "It's hard to say how long it will be before these guys heal up."
Each new owner must sign a form guaranteeing the animal will not be slaughtered and promise to return the animal if the adoption turns out not to be a good fit. Each was also asked to donate between $50 and $100 per horse to help cover medical costs for others horses recovering from more severe injuries.
Federal investigators, meanwhile, continue to probe the manner in which the horses were transported: packed in a double-deck trailer typically reserved for cattle or swine.
"The investigation is looking at the how, the why, the whole event," said Madalaine Fletcher, a spokeswoman with the U.S. Department of Agriculture's animal and plant inspection service. The state investigation wrapped up earlier this month, with a report delivered to the Lake County state's attorney's office.
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