New Yorkers and tourists in Hell’s Kitchen were greeted with the disturbing sight of a collapsed carriage horse on the street on Wednesday evening, according to local reports. Authorities responding to the scene found “a carriage horse lying in the middle of the roadway in distress,” the New York Police Department said in a later statement to W42ST. The statement continued that officers “were able to offer temporary aid to the horse by hosing it down to help it cool off.” The horse, a 14-year-old animal named Ryder, managed to rise to its feet after being sprayed down, to the cheers of onlookers. Edita Birnkrant, executive director of NYCLASS, a local animal rights nonprofit, told the outlet, “People are sick to their stomachs over this… We are so behind so many other worldwide cities that have already removed horses from the streets and replaced them with electric carriages.” A spokesperson for the local union representing carriage drivers told Gothamist that the horse had been suffering not from heat exhaustion but equine protozoal myeloencephalitis.
