Bull Kills Celebrated Spanish Bullfighter Ivan Fandino

(photo:  https://pixabay.com/en/bullfight-torero-corrida-arena-406865/)
By Faith MagbanuaJune 19th, 2017

 

On Saturday, a Spanish bullfighter has died after being gored during a festival in southwest France.

The Matador, known to the world as 36-year old bullfighter Ivan Fandino, caught his feet in his cloak and fell to the floor, where he was gored by the bull a few moments later.

According to the French Media, Fandino died from a heart-attack on his way to the hospital last Saturday while suffering from a lung injury.

Fandino, who was taking part in the Aire-sur-l'Adour bullfighting festival near Pau, is reportedly the first matador to die in France in over a century.

The Basque-born matador had already taken part in a competition earlier in the day before he was injured.

Photographs showing the matador - conscious but bleeding heavily - as he was led away from the ring were all over internet.

Last July, another bullfighter named Victor Barrio, 29, became the first matador to die in Spain in 30 years after he was gored during an event being aired live on television.

France's Sud-Ouest newspaper said that the last matador fatality in France occurred in 1921 when Isidoro Mari Fernando died in the arena in Béziers.

Throughout his career, Fandino had been wounded at least twice in previous events - once in 2015, when he was thrown into the air by a bull in Pamplona, Spain, but more seriously injured the year before when he was knocked unconscious in Bayonne, France.

Opponents describe the blood-soaked pageants as barbaric, while fans say the tradition is an ancient art form deeply rooted in national history.

Bullfighting was declared legal in France in 2012 after the Constitutional Council rejected a plea from animal rights campaigners to ban the practice.

More than 1,000 bulls are killed annually in French bullfights, the AFP news agency reported at the time.

Although the art of bullfighting originated in neighboring Spain, it took root in France a century and a half ago. Fights - known as corridas in Spain - are especially popular in the Nimes and Arles areas.

 

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