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Why So Many Horses Have Died at Santa Anita
Source: New York Times
Why So Many Horses Have Died at Santa Anita
By Joe Drape and Corina Knoll
June 26, 2019
ARCADIA, Calif. — On the morning of March 29, Santa Anita Park was reopening for racing for the first time in three weeks after the mystifying deaths of nearly two dozen horses.
Satellite trucks, national news reporters and animal rights activists converged for what had become a macabre death watch.
But California regulators were watching a live surveillance feed of a trainer’s assistant carrying a bucket into the stall of a horse named Tick Tock. Moments after the assistant left, a white foam was visible on the horse’s lips, often a telltale sign of performance-enhancing drugs.
Investigators later found syringes in the bucket, along with a fatigue-fighting agent known in racing parlance as a milkshake, according to hearing transcripts from the state’s Horse Racing Board.
The news that investigators believed Tick Tock had received such a concoction — before the first race on the first day of the track’s return to racing, no less — is indicative of the dysfunction that has enveloped Santa Anita the past six months, ...
-snip-
By Joe Drape and Corina Knoll
June 26, 2019
ARCADIA, Calif. — On the morning of March 29, Santa Anita Park was reopening for racing for the first time in three weeks after the mystifying deaths of nearly two dozen horses.
Satellite trucks, national news reporters and animal rights activists converged for what had become a macabre death watch.
But California regulators were watching a live surveillance feed of a trainer’s assistant carrying a bucket into the stall of a horse named Tick Tock. Moments after the assistant left, a white foam was visible on the horse’s lips, often a telltale sign of performance-enhancing drugs.
Investigators later found syringes in the bucket, along with a fatigue-fighting agent known in racing parlance as a milkshake, according to hearing transcripts from the state’s Horse Racing Board.
The news that investigators believed Tick Tock had received such a concoction — before the first race on the first day of the track’s return to racing, no less — is indicative of the dysfunction that has enveloped Santa Anita the past six months, ...
-snip-
Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/26/sports/santa-anita-horse-deaths.html