Final words of matador who was gored to death by bull after tripping over own cape
A bullfighter renowned for his fearlessness in the ring met a grizzly end thanks to a bull's horns when he tripped over his cape.
Ivan Fandiño was competing in the Aire-sur-l'Adour bullfighting festival in southwest France, in 2017, when he was gorged by the giant animal and did not survive the attack.
The veteran matador's harrowing final words were later revealed, as he reportedly said: “Hurry up, I’m dying” as he was being rushed away for treatment.
Fandiño, originally from the Basque country, had been a matador for 12 years and was known for his willingness to confront bulls that others deemed too dangerous.
Advert
Before his injury, he had already taken part in a competition earlier that day.
The matador and father had caught his feet in his cloak and fell to the floor where he was gored by the half-tonne bull.
The animal’s horn pierced a number of vital organs in Fandiño’s torso, including his lungs.
Photographs at the time showed him conscious as he was led away from the ring while bleeding heavily.
French media reported that he then died on his way to hospital from a heart attack.
Matador Juan del Alamo, who later killed the bull, said at the time: “I can't believe it. None of us understand how it could have happened; it was all so fast. The bull knocked him down with its hindquarters and he fell face down."
Fandiño had been injured in the ring at least twice before. In 2015, he was thrown into the air by a bull in Pamplona, Spain. And more seriously, the year before, he had been knocked unconscious in Bayonne, France.
It was reported that Fandiño was the first matador to die in France in a century. The country’s France's Sud-Ouest newspaper said Isidoro Mari Fernando was its last, when he died in the arena in Béziers in 1921.
Fandiño was honoured by the Spanish royal family and prime minister at the time with King Felipe tweeting a tribute to a ‘great bullfighter figure’.
The matador’s death came nearly a year after Spanish Victor Barrio became the first matador to die in Spain in 30 years, after he was gored at an event on live television.
Bullfighting is an extremely controversial practice and was declared legal in France in 2012 despite pleas from animal rights campaigners to ban it.
And despite pleas in Spain, it remains legal there with it considered to be part of the country’s ‘cultural heritage.'
Topics: Animals, Health, Sport, World News
Jess Battison