Equine Emergency Incident Management Seminar/Wetlab
September 30 @ 8:00 am - October 2 @ 5:00 pm AWST
The program will consist of three separate one-day courses at Ascot Racecourse from 30 September to 2 October 2026, each tailored to a different sector and making use of Ascot’s unique environment for realistic large animal rescue training. Wednesday will bring together emergency services and animal incident response personnel, including Police, fire and rescue, SES, local government rangers and animal welfare/emergency management agencies. Thursday will be for Eventing WA, the wider equestrian sporting community and the public. Friday will be a dedicated Racing and Wagering WA course for RWWA employees, building on previous technical large animal rescue training delivered at Ascot. Practical scenarios will utilise the racecourse environment, including stalls, barriers, floats, ditches, watercourses and the lake, providing hands-on training for the types of locations and situations in which horses can become trapped, injured or require emergency extraction. Veterinarians and veterinary nurses are welcome to attend Wednesday or Thursday, with RWWA coordinating veterinary attendance for Friday.
Who should attend
Day dependent: Veterinarians, Veterinary nurses and RWWA employees.
Learning outcomes
The core principles of large animal rescue and incident management will be consistent across the three days, the practical scenarios and outcomes will be geared towards the particular roles and needs of each group.
- Wednesday: Emergency services, rangers and RSPCA
- Thursday: Equestrian sport, Eventing WA and FEI veterinarians
- Friday: Racing and Wagering Western Australia staff and veterinarians
Further details
Presented by:
David King ESM – Acting Chair, Animal Emergency Incident Management Network Australia & New Zealand (AEIMN ANZ)
David King is a nationally recognised specialist in large animal rescue and animal emergency incident management, with almost 40 years of operational rescue experience. He is a retired senior NSW State Emergency Service (NSW SES) officer and former Deputy Commander of the Hawkesbury Unit, and remains an active NSW SES Rescue Operator specialising in Large Animal Rescue Operations.
David has been instrumental in developing large animal rescue capability within NSW emergency services. He helped establish and expand the NSW SES Large Animal Rescue Operations (LARO) program, which has now trained more than 1,200 rescue operators across NSW SES zones and partner agencies.
