Rodeo star, 14 horses die in crash

RYCROFT, Alberta – A veteran rodeo star and 14 of his horses were killed in a head-on collision in western Canada, police said Wednesday.

Royal Canadian Mounted Police said a tractor-trailer carrying 15 horses collided with a pickup truck Tuesday near Rycroft in west-central Alberta. The driver and 14 of the horses were killed.

Police have not released the man’s name, but friends confirmed it was 68-year-old Herman Flad.

A man and a child in the pickup were taken to a hospital.

Flad was a veteran of Canada’s chuckwagon racing circuit. The sport, involving four thoroughbred horses pulling a covered wooden wagon, is popular at rodeos mainly in western Canada, such as the Calgary Stampede.

Kelly Sutherland, a longtime friend and a fellow chuckwagon driver, said Flad’s death is a blow to the chuckwagon community.

“He spent the better part of 50 years with horses – he was a true traditional cowboy. He just loved the sport of chuckwagon racing like nobody else,” said Sutherland.

Flad won the Calgary Stampede Rangeland Derby title in 1980, the Grande Prairie Stompede in 1998 and the Edmonton Klondike Chuckwagon Derby in 2001.

Chuckwagons were traditionally used by pioneers to carry food and cooking supplies.