Footloose Malibu Horse Takes the Road Less Traveled

• Local Firefighters Cut 10-Year-Old Icelandic Gelding Free from Dense Brush

BY ANNE SOBLE

With a phalanx of TV news choppers whirring overhead and the sound of reinforcement sirens piercing the air, fire crews took part in a classic Malibu melodrama last Friday that involved an unlocked gate, a rare Icelandic breed horse and dense brush more than eight feet tall.
The horse, a 10-year-old piebald gelding named Indian, and his stable mate, Castagna, wandered away from their corral when an employee on the Malibu Park property left the gate unlocked.

Icelandics are a smaller-sized registered breed, carefully maintained, that was reportedly brought to that country by the Vikings 1200 years ago. True to their usual mellow temperament, the mare stayed by the open corral but Indian headed downhill, fell into a steep ravine and became trapped in the thicket.

Fire crews used chain saws and hand tools to clear a path so the horse, which was not injured, could head back up to the corral, perhaps with less enthusiasm for the wanderer’s life.

HOMEWARD BOUND—A purebred Icelandic gelding named Indian that left its corral when the gate was accidentally left unlocked, walks away from the steep ravine in Malibu Park it had fallen into on Friday. MSN/George Hauptman