Cows bloody cows

[alwaysinjured]

Personally, I would want to know before hand if there are cows on the course and I would likely not even enter the race, don't wan't to take the risk. Short races like this I think there should be no cows on the course, it's just dangerous. With all this commotion over FRA safety rules I would think cows on the course would be more of a hazard than not having taped seams in my pack!

In my view a "statement of risk" has to note animals on the courses where it is relevant. At very least it would have formed part of the entry agreement and runner instructions on the day on the Waltz had it been a relevant issue there, because of my hand in that.

Other sports demand such statements , and note that disclaimers are little use or ornament legally, (which is all that is on our entry form)

Not our sport We don't have anyone that with interest or professional competence in safety running our sport, or in a position to make things like that happen. Indeed we refused to allow the only safety qualified person on to the safety committee, and made his position untenable to the point he resigend. All we had was people interested in "being in charge" and enforcing their view of how documentation should be structured.

If we had a responsible FRA it would have already had a cows incident review by a competent person(we do not do them) and made an urgent statement some while ago to runners and RO on the matter. (they do not disseminate either - indeed refused safety articles for fell runner) - both of those core duties of safety management
If nothing else, FRA are too slow to catch cold on the matter in getting a statement out..

At very least we should tell RO to Warn runners of cattle on the course (not done at Bamford) and to note to runners as a matter of duty, that the crush incident happened, and that unless the runners are specifically willing to shoulder that risk which is clearly uncertain and unquantifiable (but not negligible either) then not to enter the race.

For one thing the risk is subjective - Animals know you are scared and they become more bold as a result of people acting scared. Take big dogs. So just being scared of them, is enough of a reason not to enter and every reason for a responsible RO to to say something to all who enter before they commit.

The prime "duty of care" of a race organiser mentioned in rules ,but never expanded as it should be, is to manage what are called "reasonably forseeable risks". Now the "cows" has actually happened, and knowing that runners can "spook" cows, also true at Bamford, the cow attack against a runner / injury caused by them is clearly forseeable - and until evidence emerges that proves that was incidents were unique / unlikely because of a cause (so far undertermined, but common between those incidents), they should at least warn runners of cows on course now, so runners can consent in " knowledge of the risk".which is what the legal principle equivalent of "on your own head be it" demands.

It does not matter at toss whether an RO would actually be found guilty of negligence at present, it is clearly in the interests of safety, to warn runners around cows - and as a matter of caring to allow runners who hate them the choice not to enter if they are scared of them, because just by being scared, they are at greater risk.

I am concerned also about a BMC statement urging all to avoid any footpath crossing fields with cows - which begs an interesting question, on how big the risk actually is.

I dont know for sure, If I had to guess, the lack of proper incident collection statistics, is not accidental. The farming community are probably worried on what would happen if the truth were known in cold hard numbers, so prefer to keep evidence "anecdotal", leaving them less open to negligence claims: or being ordered to keep livestock off public acess fields. That is how industry pressure groups work.

But then all of this is symptomatic of a bigger problem in FRA.

We don't review even our near disasters - take Sailbeck 2014 in any meaningful way - a fatality there would have been a media death knell for fell running - let alone the (several) incidents of near fatal hypothermia and heatstroke that have happened in fell running generally in the last year-

Take one which could so easily have ended with a marshal facing a negligence claim for want of proper safety management in respect of marshal instruction and purpose - the marshal making a statement to a runner that should never have been made, nor heeded. You do not expect to go out and help marshal and come back with a two year wait for a trial.

I doubt if any on our so called "safety committee" can even name the race or the incident.
So on top of the game are they. All we in FRA do is try to sweep actual fatalities under the carpet, then do nothing for years in between, ignoring the fact that real changes in safety are actually made by reviews we do not do in any meaningful way. Not least because our erstwhile rule drafter seems to think he is the supremo of english fell running, so nothing that happens elsewhere matters to him.

The only way to make any of it happen is changes at the top, amongst those who have so far let us down so badly, and turn what should have been a patient sifting of information, leading to competent response in changed documents.
Instead of which we got a triumph of mandated stupidity for runners and RO alike. And for that the so called "key players" expect they will be and should be thanked!!! , and expect an endless number of second chances - when they do not heed even basic advice.

ha!.