Six Injured at Pamplona’s Running of the Bulls
Six people have been injured at the 2024 Running of the Bulls event in Pamplona, including one person who was gored. These incidents are yet further reminders of the barbarism involved in the San Fermín festival.
Each year, hundreds of runners are injured, and a total of 16 people have died. But while most humans escape with minor injuries, the bulls are not so lucky – around 60 are violently stabbed to death each year at this archaic spectacle.
Several people were injured on the first day of the Pamplona bull run.
The traditional bull run takes place every morning during the San Fermin festival in Pamplona, Spain.
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The San Fermín festival also has a history of sexual violence against women, and many have been calling for an end to the events since the 2016 sexual assault on an 18-year-old woman by five men.
Despite the many forms of violence being perpetrated at the festival, it continues to attract thousands of tourists, many of whom don’t realise that the animals forced to run through Pamplona’s streets will later be tortured and killed in the bullring.
What Is Done to the Bulls?
Young bulls are forced to scramble down the city’s narrow streets to flee the jeering mob. They often injure themselves as they slip on the cobbled ground or crash into walls while attempting to escape the crowd.
These animals have typically had little previous interaction with humans, and suddenly being thrust into a horde is distressing and overwhelming.
In the bullring later the same day, assailants on horses drive lances into these bulls’ back and neck before others plunge banderillas into their back, inflicting acute pain whenever they turn their head and impairing their range of motion.
Eventually, when a bull becomes weak from blood loss, a matador appears and attempts to kill the animal by plunging a sword into his lungs or, if that fails, cutting his spinal cord with a knife. The bull may be paralysed but still conscious as his ears or tail are cut off to be presented to the matador as a trophy and his body is dragged from the arena.
Learn more about the horrific torture sentient beings are subjected to during the San Fermín festival – and what you can do to help end the archaic event:
Torture, Not Tradition
More than 125 Spanish towns and cities have rejected the torment and butchering of bulls for entertainment, but in Pamplona, this cruel spectacle continues.
Bullfights, like gladiator combat and public human executions, must be consigned to the history books.
You Can Help End the Torment
Please sign our petition urging the mayor of Pamplona to end this barbaric slaughter now: