By Jennifer Todd
The Intelligencer Journal/New Era
LANCASTER, Pa. — Emergency personnel responded to a Little Britain Township farm Sunday after a pony fell through ice on a pond.
Thirteen-year-old Mickey was in the icy water for at least 45 minutes before he was rescued by firefighters and the property owner, said Robert Fulton Deputy Fire Chief Rob Sample Jr.
Sample said the pony, which was dragged out of the pond on its side, “kicked a little, then jumped up onto his feet.”
Mickey walked on his own to a nearby barn, where he was warmed with blankets, Sample said. He said a large animal veterinarian arrived at the scene as fire crews were departing.
“All in all, I’d say he’s doing very well,” Sample said. “He took the whole ordeal very well. He stayed pretty calm the whole time.”
Fire units were dispatched to 74 Camp Road around 5:15 p.m. and found the pony near the shoreline of the pond which, Sample said, is 5 or 6 feet deep.
He said a woman, whom he believed to be the owner of the pony, was holding the animal’s lead, helping to keep it above the water.
Sample said crews were initially going to use ropes and a winch to pull Mickey from the icy pond but decided against it out of concern that the ice might cut the pony because of the way the animal was situated.
He said he called in the services of Fulton Township roadmaster Billy Taylor, who was en route to the scene with a backhoe to try to free the animal.
Before Taylor could arrive, however, rescuers were able to turn the pony around, and he was pulled from the water by the property owner, who used ropes attached to the loader bucket of a tractor.
Sample wasn’t certain how Mickey ended up in the pond but said people at the scene speculated that another horse might have chased the pony.
He said the pony’s owner and others at the scene were “extremely ecstatic and grateful” that Mickey was able to be rescued.
“There were a lot of tears,” he said. “And thankfully, a happy ending.”
Copyright 2011 Lancaster Newspapers, Inc.