Thoroughbreds jogged on the main racetrack at Del Mar Monday morning as life after the horrific training track fire in nearby Bonsal began to settle for horses and horsemen involved with the events at San Luis Rey Downs last Thursday.
Del Mar Thoroughbred Club and the 22nd District Agricultural Association officials reported a total of 260 Thoroughbreds and approximately 500 other-breed horses stabled on the track's backstretch. The Thoroughbreds were expected to stay on for at least several weeks, while the other horses gradually were filtering out to their farms, primarily in the North County area of San Diego. Del Mar also reported via Twitter Monday that San Luis Rey Equine Hospital is now open and fully functional.
Whereas there was initially an issue of finding and identifying dozens of the 400 or so horses evacuated from San Luis Rey–with approximately 240 of them coming to Del Mar–that search number has been reduced to only a handful and those are hoped and expected to be found at other farms or facilities in the area.
The severe Santa Ana winds that had fanned the flames of the so-called “Lilac fire” in Bonsal, causing havoc to overtake the normally serene training facility, have mostly subsided. Fire crews have beaten back the 4,100-acre blaze and reports Monday had it at 75% contained.
In its wake, at least eight barns at San Luis Rey were destroyed and a California Horse Racing Board report stated that 46 horses had been lost. Multiple other reports and videos showed courageous and heroic actions by grooms and trainers who ran into the flames and smoke to drop webbings and free horses from their stalls, thus perhaps saving hundreds of horses from being burned to death.
Several sites have gone up online for donations toward aiding those directly impacted by the fire. One of the first ones up–a Santa Anita/Del Mar backed GoFundMe site–has already raised nearly $600,000 toward aid.
Two other sites are raising extensive funds toward medical payments for trainer Martine Bellocq, who suffered severe burns during the blaze and is currently hospitalized at UCSD Medical Center in San Diego. Those are sponsored by California Thoroughbred Trainers through the California Thoroughbred Horsemen's Foundation at CTHFcares.org and at GoFundMe.
Among the many individual offers of help put forward is a unique one from the noted equine artist Niska Cheffet, who has said she will do a painting for anyone who will make a donation of $1,000 toward aiding victims of the fire. Cheffet can be reached at [email protected].
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