ONE thing I learned over the past few years was that not everyone wanted the safest head protection for horse riders. This came as a very big shock to me.

Following a tragic fatal head injury to a rider in 1995 who was wearing an up-to-date equestrian helmet, I asked a consultant engineer to investigate the existing helmet standard, which was at the time the latest EU standard, and to produce a report.

He did so, and found that helmets produced to that standard did not comply with the EU Personal Protective Equipment Directive (PPE). We needed to have a review of the just published standard (for which Ireland had voted NO in the final voting stages). How to proceed was the question?

Jack Phillips, a neurosurgeon at Beaumont Hospital and who also had an interest in horse-related head injuries, provided a comprehensive report to backup our argument in Europe. The chief medical officers from the Turf Club were very helpful and National Standards Authority in Ireland (NSAI) offered us help, support and advice. Healy Racing photographers supplied us with pictures illustrating what can happen in a racing fall illustrating the necessity for improved head protection.

Brussels

Armed with this support the next move was to apply to the EU Commission’s petitions committee in Brussels for a hearing. The Petitions Committee members supported our plea for the best possible helmet standard and several British members of the Petitions Committee who came up to me afterward were supportive.

In the interim NSAI appointed myself and an engineer as Irish representatives on Working Group 5 (WG5) which was responsible for writing equestrian helmets standards.

Meetings from time to time were held in most EU capitals including Helsinki, Milan, London, and Dublin. Arising from the petition, the European Committee for Standardisation (CEN) had been given a mandate by the Commission to write a higher specification standard for horse riders’ helmets which would sit alongside the existing specification one. Not everyone was happy about having two standards, but it solved a problem for those who still wanted to build helmets to the original specification. We explained it did not give sufficient protection to the temple area and did not have any lateral protection for a horse rolling over someone on the ground.

Fashion items

As we set about writing this new high specification standard (EN 14572) it was notable that all the objectors to the original standard disappeared and took no further part in meetings, they had the standard they wanted. Riding helmets can be and are sometimes fashion items, and that rider safety is not always the most important item on the agenda.

I now believe EN 14572 was a red herring, which delayed progress for a single standard by several years. Strangely, it also became a cited standard, but as manufacturers said that they could not make a wearable version of it, the Commission subsequently withdrew it from the O.J.

Then things began to change.

We had a new convenor of our working group, Dr Adrian McGoldrick, a senior Turf Club medical officer, supported by Elizabeth O’Farrell of NSAI. Around this time (April 2009) I appealed once again to the Petitions Committee mainly to protest and complain about the lack of progress of the new standard, especially by CEN.

The old standard was eventually withdrawn by the Commission in 2014. Then Europe no longer had any riding helmet standard. WG5 (under changed personnel) were given the task of finishing the writing of the new standard which is the one we have today.

While Adrian and Liz were on the WG5 committee, together with Professor Michael Gilchrist of UCD, they oversaw a £4 million EU grant, shared with three universities to research head safety. Ireland was being recognised as a centre of excellence for matters to do with riding helmets, which is of course positive, and hopefully will lead to further similar projects for UCD. Our request for funding was being heard.

Having completed a term as convenor of WG5, and having had the same problems with the German and French representatives objecting to improvements without hope of any arriving at a consensus, Adrian resigned.

The task of convenor was passed to the German expert on the Working Group. A meeting in Düsseldorf during an industry trade fair was arranged but did not take place. Subsequently no other WG5 meetings were arranged, and manufacturers were allowed to continue producing sub-optimal helmets.

Second appeal

The Commission was well aware of problems concerning equestrian helmets. Mairead McGuinness MEP who had been supporting us from the time of the second appeal in 2010, arranged and sponsored a meeting for me with some senior Commission administrators in Brussels, allowing me to plead my case, and explain exactly what was required.

The British PAS 015 is regarded as the current best available standard for equestrian helmets. I based my submission to follow the PAS specification as closely as possible, by doing so manufacturers could not claim inability to manufacture something which was already in production..

We eventually had a new convenor in Claire Williams M.D.of BETA, a British Trade Organisation. We were lucky to have her. Her job was to get this new standard through the system and have it published. The new standard was published in the OJ on December 11th 2023. Our objectives were achieved, but it took twenty seven years!

Claire took over a divided Working Group to finish writing the standard but she seemed to have a little divine help on her side. Claire politely took objections on board and dealt with them, mostly by explaining that the CEN consultant engineer would not accept the changes to a lower specification. Objectors accepted her ruling and we got on with the job. We now have an official European standard to build on for the future.

It would have been desirable to have added in some extras to the standard but this can be done by way of revision at a later stage. All the time we are looking at ways to avoid concussion and brain rotation damage.

A big thanks to all those people who have helped us with this project, not forgetting Doug Burns NSAI who got us started.

Some ideas for moving forward:

1. A sandwich of different foam densities would be ideal as a helmet liner to deal with different situations and forces.

2. MIPS membrane, a Swedish invention. The membrane is placed between the outer helmet cover and the inner liner. It allows for 5-10mm movement to take the initial shock to a helmet to reduce concussions. Though not a requirement of the standard, some riding helmets use it. It is also used in bicycle helmets.

3. A band of non-stretch well secured tape (kevlar) around the rim of a helmet can improve helmet lateral protection from 800n to maybe 2.5Kn. We have already done some unofficial tests on this.