Stay in the barn? A horse says ‘neigh’ and is rescued from canal with help of location app

Ella Tikka reports for Erewash Sound: A Derbyshire horse found itself in a frosty situation recently when it got stuck in an icy Erewash Canal. Luckily, a quick-thinking passer-by, fire and rescue crews, and an app to pin point a person's location came to the rescue.

In the early hours of Thursday 21st November, an emergency call was made to report that the horse was stuck in the waterway and although navigating in the dark and describing the remote location could have been a ‘mare', the caller shared the horse’s exact location using a geo-location given by the what3words app which helped guide rescue crews to the scene quickly and efficiently.

App officials have divided the globe into 57 trillion 3m x 3m squares, with each one given a unique combination of three random words from which the exact location can be pinpointed.  Officials describe it as ideal for use, in areas with unreliable data connection as it it functions off line, making it ideal for use in areas such as rural farms, remote woods, parks, and campsites. The technology is used by over 85% of UK emergency services.

Blue Watch Alfreton, with support from Eastwood’s on-call fire station, leapt into action, putting their specialised animal rescue skills to work. They created a barrel-skid with yellow strops to carefully pull the horse from the icy water. Once safely ashore, the horse was assessed by vets, wrapped snugly in blankets, and treated to some hay. Before long, the horse’s body temperature rose to normal, and the horse is now safe at home and in a stable condition.

A statement said that the advance of winter offered a timely reminder to check on animals during cold and frosty days and ensure fields and paddocks are secure to avoid similar incidents, and highlights the importance of being able to describe a precise location quickly. It added: "We’d hay-te to think what might have happened without the passerby’s quick thinking and the app."