Tracks Join Rallying Cry to End Cargo Shipping

American racetracks have started taking a stand against a long-time practice of shipping inexpensive racehorses to Puerto Rico by cargo ship. The often grueling trip many characterize as cruel and inhumane has attracted a growing clamor of protests industrywide, sparked by the brutal death of nine horses during one shipment two years ago.

Multiple track executives implemented policies this month that allow any owner or trainer with horses stabled at their facilities to be banned if they are associated with shipping a horse in this manner.

The problem with shipping horses on a cargo boat is the container they occupy, which is in no way comparable to a box stall on a tractor trailer. These containers are 40-foot steel boxes with windows cut out of the sides, metal hay racks welded inside, wooden dividers installed to separate the animals, and a fan affixed to a small window on one end to circulate air. Horses, commonly 10-12 but sometimes up to 15, are loaded from one end to the other and stand side by side as if in a starting gate for days.

"The worst of all of this is the way these containers are made," said Dr. Jose Garcia Blanco, a veterinarian and bloodstock agent who buys for the Confederación Hípica of Puerto Rico, the largest of the island's two Thoroughbred owners' organizations. "Once you put your second horse in there, you don't have access to your first horse. The attendant can have access to their heads so they can feed them and give them water, but once you put that second horse in there, if something goes wrong with the first horse, he's doomed, because you cannot get to him."

"Up until two weeks ago, if you told me someone was shipping a horse in a container like this, I would have not believed it," said Eric Halstrom, vice president and general manager of racing at Indiana Grand, who became the first track Aug. 9 to implement a ban related to cargo shipping. "Our company, Caesar's Entertainment, is growing in racing, and we feel the welfare of the horses is most important. I agree it will not be simple to track, but we will deal with each case individually and if we have a case where Point A connects to Point B, then we have a policy that we will stand behind. We are not going to be unfair to horsemen and allow situations to be explained. But if it is pretty clear, then these are people we don't want participating."

A similar ban was announced Aug. 17 by 1/ST Racing, which is The Stronach Group's rebranded entity operating Gulfstream Park, Santa Anita Park, Laurel Park, Pimlico Race Course, and Golden Gate Fields.

Gulfstream Park has issued an advisory on the shipment of horses by cargo ship. pic.twitter.com/rBLyNZcE1Z

— Florida Horsemen (@FloridaHorsemen) August 17, 2021

"As part of 1/ST Racing's ongoing and steadfast commitment to achieving the highest standard of horse care and safety in Thoroughbred racing, we reviewed the shipment of horses via cargo ship to race and train in other parts of the world," read a statement from Aidan Butler, 1/ST Racing's chief operating officer. "In consultation with our chief veterinary officer, Dr. Dionne Benson, we have determined that the conditions in which these horses are transported via cargo ship are inappropriate, inhumane, and represent a significant risk to their health and welfare.

"Accordingly, effective immediately, any trainer or owner who is associated with shipping horses via cargo ship will no longer be welcome at any of our training or racing facilities. Trainers and owners shipping horses are responsible for performing the required due diligence to ensure horses in their care are transported in safety, by humane methods. Failure to prevent the shipping of horses via cargo ship will result in immediate removal of the associated owner or trainer's horses from any, and all, 1/ST Racing venues."

Other racing industry organizations have denounced this method of shipping including the Florida Horsemen's Benevolent and Protective Association and New York Thoroughbred Breeders. A Change.org petition asking the Puerto Rico Department of Agriculture to ban this method of transport has attracted more than 17,200 signatures, according to Chrissy Laughlin of Caribbean Thoroughbred Aftercare.

Endangering Horses for More Than a Decade

People have been shipping horses safely on boats for centuries.

Beginning in the early 2000s, however, TOTE Maritime out of Jacksonville, Fla., began allowing the shipping of horses in modified cargo containers. Puerto Rican owners and agents gravitated toward the sea route instead of shipping by plane to save money, particularly with inexpensive horses claimed at tracks throughout the U.S. An owner spends $1,400 per horse to ship by cargo ship versus $2,500-$3,000 to ship by air. Early on, equine shippers in the U.S. said only broodmares were sent on the cargo boats. Gradually horses in training were added.

The worst possible scenario unraveled in 2019 at sea with a load of 15 horses that left Jacksonville April 30. When the ship arrived in San Juan, eight of the horses were dead and one was so badly wounded it was euthanized at the port. The incident led to a lawsuit between Confederación Hípica, which owned four of the dead horses, and four other owners. Individual settlements are still being negotiated in this suit, according to lawyers involved with the case.

Horses endure these cramped conditions for nearly four days. The trip is commonly described as a two-day trip, but that is only how long the horses are at sea. Typically the horses making this trip are picked up at a farm west of Jacksonville near the small community of Glen St. Mary. On a Tuesday afternoon, someone with Hermanos Ruiz (a shipping outfit run by Alberto "Cano" Santiago and Andres Ruiz Arismendi) picks up the horses, which may be Thoroughbreds and/or Standardbreds, and loads them into a shipping container they won't leave until they get to Puerto Rico. These horses then get trucked to the Port of Jacksonville, where they are loaded onto a TOTE Maritime ship, which does not leave the port until 3 a.m. Wednesday and will arrive around midnight on Thursday. The horses stay on the boat until mid-Friday morning because the longshoremen don't start unloading until 9 a.m.

The tight space, poor air circulation on the boats, and having their heads tied predispose these horses to serious health problems they'll suffer with long after they've disembarked.

"You have them in close contact with each other, and they can't put their heads down. When a horse cannot lower its head, you are predisposing it to all kinds of respiratory disease because you're taking away one of their main barriers of protection, of cleaning up their respiratory system," said Garcia Blanco. "When horses lower their heads to eat, their respiratory system drains. They have all kinds of excrement and urine in that container, and they can't move, which is another method that gets their circulation going.

"So you're predisposing them to shipping fever by the stress you're putting on them and predisposing them to laminitis. The respiratory system is probably the one that gets affected the most," Garcia Blanco said.

Kelley Stobie, co-founder of Caribbean Thoroughbred Aftercare, has seen first-hand for years the toll the journey takes on these horses as she watched them unloaded at Hipodromo Camarero.

"This is unacceptable and it's inhumane. I have been in these containers, and I see how the horses are when they come out," Stobie said. "There is no way to make this better. What we have been finding when these horses come off is they need fluids, they need Banamine, and need to get hand-walked. Most of the horses who end up dying soon after are just thrown into a stall with hay and water and that's it."

Stobie knows of one horse this year that came in by boat on Friday and the trainer had it gallop on the track the next day. The horse died within the following week.

"Usually the shipped horses die pretty quick; they don't last that long," Stobie continued. "Once they've gotten dehydrated and fever then they start to get pleural pneumonia or laminitis. Most of the ones that we've tracked that have died, died within a week or two after coming in."

Puerto Rico has seen a record number of horses shipped in by cargo ship this year because of extraordinarily rich purses being offered at Camarero, an increase fueled by a big jump in handle this year. The purse structure in Puerto Rico is different than in the U.S. in that a published purse is not the only money owners and trainers receive. Puerto Rico has retroactive pay, which is a handle-driven bonus.

For example, a $4,000 claiming race may have a published purse of $6,000. At the end of each month after purses, bettors, the government, off-track betting agents, and Breeders' Fund contributions are all paid, what remains from the handle is split between the racetrack and the owners. The owners' share of the handle is then paid out as retroactive pay. In June, the retroactive pay was around 130% of the purse for a race. So the payout on the $4,000 claimer was actually $13,800.

"It is a fact that the purse structure at Camarero benefits the cheap claimer," said Ervin Rodriguez, president and CEO of Camarero. "In terms of purse versus claim price, the cheaper horses have a disproportionate advantage."

From January through June of this year, 138 horses were shipped to Puerto Rico by cargo ship—many of them claimed at lower-tier U.S. racetracks. The CTA, which typically takes in about 40 horses a year, received before June around 38 horses that could no longer race.

In the recent past, cargo shipments were confined to the cooler months because it put less stress on the horses while at sea. This year shipments have been coming in almost weekly since January and did not let up until after the first week in August and only because of concerns about shipping during the tropical storm season. Shipments are expected to resume around the beginning of October.

Savings Keep the Cargo Shipments Full

Clearly, many Puerto Rican owners have no concern about using the cargo ships.

"As always, they arrive with some setbacks, but nothing complicated," said owner and former House of Representatives member Edwin Mundo in an article published June 4 by the Center for Investigative Journalism in Puerto Rico. "If I have an expensive horse, I spend a little more and I bring it by plane. If I have a cheap horse, I bring it on the boat."

Florida veterinarian Hiram Pomales also believes shipping by cargo ship is acceptable. Pomales, who has been a practicing vet around Ocala since 1998, said he has been involved with shipping horses to Puerto Rico by air and by boat for about 20 years and defended the latter practice as safe and humane.

"What happened in 2019, the divisions they used were lower than they should be and they had bad weather, so it added together," Pomales told BloodHorse. "It is hard to convince people about the mechanism we use and the results. I have done this almost 20 years. One bad event in 20 years is nothing. I have worked with Greg Jackson shipping them by plane and with Luis Morales by boat, and more recently with Alberto Santiago. Some get a little cough, but they are not in bad shape or mistreated. I have horses myself, and I love horses. I would not do this if I didn't feel comfortable."

Pomales signs off on every health certificate for the animals transported on the cargo ships to Puerto Rico, which also might include miniature horses, mules, goats, llamas, and alpacas. The vet said he regularly makes the one-hour drive to Elizabeth Leete's farm near Jacksonville to inspect the horses before they are shipped. He said he also inspects horses at his farm or other farms around Ocala before they are sent on to Leete's farm. Pomales is reportedly paid $100 for each horse health inspection and certificate, according to several horsemen.

"If a horse is not in good condition, we don't put them on the boat," Pomales said. "The containers are well divided. They have a good bed of shavings. They get alfalfa and plenty of water."

When asked about the restricted access to the horses after they are loaded into the container, Pomales said he understands the concern and recognized that attending to an injured horse "is impossible." But Pomales also said substituting the containers with box stalls similar in size to what is used on a tractor trailer would not allow Hermanos Ruiz to ship enough horses to cover its costs.

"Making a box stall and having three or four instead of 13 spaces I don't think it would be feasible moneywise for these people. They wouldn't make it," he said.

A former employee of Leete's farm, Joshua Thurber, said he worked there for a year before he was fired because he kept questioning how the horses being shipped to Puerto Rico were being treated.

"We would get horses throughout the week that were 400 or 500 pounds underweight, and I would tell them these horses are not going to survive the trip. They would go anyway," said Thurber, who added that his family's involvement in horse racing goes back to his grandfather, Jim Pitcock, who was a trainer in Indiana. "It's totally inhumane the way they are shipping these horses. I eventually got a text from Elizabeth that said I was fired because I did not get along with Alberto, who handled the shipping. These people don't know how to handle horses and don't know how to take care of them."

Thurber also said he did not see Pomales regularly at the farm to inspect the horses.

Pomales said he remembered Thurber and didn't know him very well but said the farm worker wasn't being truthful.

"He's probably saying these things because he got fired," Pomales said. "Elizabeth and her sister, Stephanie, own the farm and it is a beautiful farm with show horses. They would not allow anyone to mistreat horses. They would be the first to tell Alberto he was mishandling a horse or doing something illegal."

Pomales also said he has prevented the shipment of many horses that were not fit for the trip.

"Some of them we have to stop. Let's say a horse runs Saturday at Belterra and it gets sent to Florida on Sunday. Then they want to get the trip to Puerto Rico on Tuesday but that is a no-no. We don't do that so they arrive in good shape," he said.

BloodHorse left voice mail messages with both Leete and Santiago but those calls were not returned.

Garcia Blanco said shipping horses on cargo boats cannot be defended simply because horses are surviving the voyages, and while he understands the need for people involved to make a living, the same company that owns TOTE Maritime—Saltchuk Company—also owns StratAir, which provides the air transport service to Puerto Rico.

"That's kind of the crazy thing with this whole issue," said Garcia Blanco. "The people doing the shipping are still going to do the shipping. The vets who sign off on the health certificates can still sign off on the health certificates. You are just shipping the horses in a more humane way."

BloodHorse contacted Krista Williams with Saltchuk who said: "We are appreciative of those who are speaking up, and we trust TOTE in its process to understand the concerns raised."

Williams said she forwarded the BloodHorse's questions to Heather Alves with TOTE Maritime, who did not respond to subsequent emails.

"I get the economics, but if you're investing money in horses, everybody knows this is not an inexpensive game. Period," Garcia Blanco continued. "So, is it really worth that risk to put a horse in a cargo container? I understand that a lot of these horses, maybe, survive the trip, but the toll that it takes on them, they pay for it later in terms of getting sick or maybe getting injured. It's worse for them down the road and these horses are suffering. It's just horrible."