A spooked horse broke free from its driver in Central Park Wednesday and smashed into another horse-drawn carriage, leaving an 18-year-old passenger in critical condition, officials said.
The animal took off around 3 p.m. before crashing near Tavern on the Green, according to witnesses at the scene. A police spokesperson said the critically injured male passenger was taken to NewYork-Presbyterian Weill Cornell Medical Center.
The incident comes amid an ongoing dispute pitting animal rights advocates, politicians and the Central Park Conservancy against the union representing carriage horse drivers. The conservancy and its allies want the horses out of the park, saying they are abused and mistreated. The union says the carriage horses are an important part of the Central Park experience and provide stable jobs.
Last week, a carriage horse collapsed and died. The carriage horse drivers union held a press conference on Tuesday to announce that a necropsy revealed the steed had ingested a fatal amount of a toxic invasive shrub.
Kate Blumm, a spokesperson for the Central Park Conservancy, said that the crash underscored the need to ban the industry from the park.
“As details of today’s incident come into focus, our thoughts are with the injured. That this frightening situation is just days after the previous one underscores the dangers posed by horse carriages to Park visitors, carriage drivers, other animals, and the horses themselves,” she wrote in a statement.
“The Central Park Conservancy renews its call to ban carriages in Central Park as a matter of public safety and public health. We hope today’s injuries are the last we ever see.”
Christina Hansen, a horse carriage driver and TWU shop steward, said she was working in the park when she heard that a horse was running down the drive toward Tavern on the Green. She drove her carriage down to intercept the runaway animal. She said she found the horse standing by the flipped carriage.
“They had gone to see the Bow Bridge at Cherry Hill, and everybody was getting back on the carriage, and something happened. He (the driver) said he didn’t hear anything … [the] horse took off,” she said.
Officers from the NYPD’s mounted unit inspected the horse, which was uninjured.
Helen David, a pedicab driver, said she saw multiple people loaded into an ambulance after the crash.
Another eyewitness, Ron Pobuda, said he saw people spilling out of the carriage.
“It happened so quickly. They didn’t have a chance to think about running or getting out of there. They just fell over,” Pobuda said.
Mayor Zohran Mamdani has said that the horses should be banned from the park. But he’s also said he would work with the drivers union to figure out a way to prevent its members from losing jobs.
Liam Quigley
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