Ready to find out how horses travelled to Tokyo for the Olympic Games?

Eager to find out how horses travelled to Tokyo? This article provides an excellent overview of the plane journey and how they settled in ahead of the Games.

In a piece of history-making, 36 horses flew into Japan for the Tokyo Olympic Games in July 2021. The first full cargo load of horses ever to land in Haneda did so ahead of the eagerly anticipated Games following the COVID-19 pandemic.

The waterfront airport that serves the greater Tokyo area was now welcoming a very different group of Olympic athletes.

It was a really big night for the airport, and particularly for the cargo team, and it as one of the major milestones of the final countdown to the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games.

The four-legged time travellers were all Equestrian Dressage horses and include some Olympic superstars, among them Bella Rose, the mare ridden by Germany’s Isabell Werth, the most decorated Olympic equestrian athlete of all time.

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Also landing at Haneda en route to the stunning equestrian venue at Baji Koen was Gio, the ride of double Olympic champion Charlotte Dujardin (GBR), who did the bidding for a three-in-a-row title in Tokyo.

The 36 equine passengers were for teams from Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Germany, Great Britain, Netherlands, Portugal and host nation Japan, as well as individuals from Brazil, Estonia, Finland, Ireland and Morocco. And they were joined by a further group of Equestrian Dressage stars who flew in the nex day.

The first Olympic flight out of Europe saw the horses travelling from Liege in Belgium, where there’s even a special airport horse hotel, flying on an Emirates SkyCargo Boeing 777-F to Dubai, a 90-minute refuel and crew change and then on to Tokyo.

Like human passengers, all horses travel with a passport. They will already have undergone a 60-day health surveillance period before a seven-day pre-export quarantine. They all also have an export health certificate and are thoroughly checked over by veterinarians prior to boarding.

Horses Travel Business Class

The horses fly two per pallet, otherwise known as a flying stable, which is the equivalent of business class. Their comfort and safety are ensured by flying grooms and an on-board veterinarian. And, unlike two-legged passengers, the horses not only get their in-flight meals (including special meal requests of course), but can snack throughout the trip, on hay or haylage, except when they are taking a nap.

So as they fly business class, does that mean the horses get flat beds to sleep in? Although horses might occasionally indulge in a spot of lying down to snooze in the sun at home, they sleep standing up. They have something called the “stay apparatus”, which allows tendons and ligaments to effectively lock the knees and hocks (in the hind legs) so that they don’t fall over while they’re dozing off. So there’s no need for flat beds on the flight.

A total of 325 horses flew into Tokyo across the two Games and the complex logistics for this massive airlift have been coordinated by transport agents, Peden Bloodstock. The transport company has been in charge of Olympic and Paralympic horse transport since Rome 1960 and is the Official Equine Logistics Partner of the Fédération Equestre Internationale (FEI).

A convoy of 11 state-of-the-art air-conditioned horse trucks, owned by the Japanese Racing Association, transported the precious equine cargo – and 13,500 kilograms of equipment – on the final transfer from Haneda to Baji Koen where the equine superstars had the chance to settle into their Olympic Athlete Village, aka the stables.

Fast flight facts

• 18 hours 15 minutes – flight time Liege to Tokyo, with a touchdown in Dubai
• Aircraft detail: Emirates SkyCargo Boeing 777-F (flight numbers EK9388 LGG-DXB, EK9442 DXB-HND)
• 19 flying stables on-board
• Dimensions of the flying stables: 317cms long, 244cms wide, 233cms high
• 14-17° Celsius – on-board temperature
• 36 Dressage horses – teams from Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Germany, Great Britain, Netherlands, Portugal and host nation Japan, and individual horses from Brazil, Estonia, Finland, Ireland and Morocco.
• 22,700kgs +/- total weight of horses flying from Liege
• 630kg is the average weight of a Dressage horse
• 13,500kgs of horse equipment
• 12,000 kgs of feed (not including in-flight meals & snacks)
• 40 litres of water per horse

Total transport trivia across both Games

• 247 – total number of horses travelling to Tokyo for the Olympic Games
• 78 – total number of horses travelling to Tokyo for the Paralympic Games
• 630kg – average weight of a Dressage horse; 515kg – average weight of an Eventing horse; 610kg – average weight of a Jumping horse
• 14 – total number of horse flights for the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games
• 5 – total number of horse flights for the Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games
• 100,000kgs – total weight of the horse equipment (including saddles, bridles, boots, bandages, rugs, lungeing equipment, headcollars, grooming kits, shoes & studs, wheelbarrows & pitch forks)
• 60,000kgs – total feed weight (feed/haylage)
• 185 – total number of truck journeys between Haneda airport and the equestrian park at Baji Koen

Unique gender equality

Equestrian is the only sport in the Olympic movement in which men and women compete head to head throughout the Games, making it a totally gender-neutral sport. And the FEI doesn’t need a policy regarding transgender athletes as there are no requirements for our athletes to state their gender in order to participate in FEI competitions, or at the Olympic and Paralympic Games.

Equestrian is not a gender-affected sport that relies on the physical strength, stamina and physique of an athlete as there are no gender based biological advantages. Success in equestrian is largely determined by the unique bond between horse and athlete and refined communication with the horse.

Sustainability

Sustainability is a key theme across the Games, and equestrian is very much a part of that. In line with Pillar 1 of the IOC Sustainability Strategy: Minimum Environmental Burden, the redevelopment of the Japan Racing Association-owned Baji Koen Park as the equestrian venue for Tokyo 2020 has minimised environmental impact and ensured the legacy of the venue used for the Tokyo Games in 1964.

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