Gruesome images captured the moment an American’s calf was impaled during Monday’s Bulls race in Pamplona, Spain.
The 25-year-old man from Sunshine, Fla., grimaced in pain when the horn completely pierced his left lower leg on the return of the San Fermín Festival on the bloodiest day so far this year.
The Florida man, identified by only the initials MT by local officials, suffered the horrific injury after one of the cops pinched a line of runners on a fence at the city’s bullring.
Video shows the animal throwing several of the screaming runners around before the injured American and several others nearby manage to leap over the fence to safety.
MT wasn’t the only one impaled on Monday, local officials said.
Two other people, both 29-year-old Spaniards, were also impaled, one in the knee and one in the groin, the Navarre regional government said. One of the victims had also been injured in the ring while the other had been impaled while running through the local streets. The government stressed that no one was in serious condition.
Three other runners, all Spanish, were treated for injuries sustained from falls during the run, which lasted just over 3 minutes.
The long-controversial festival, which has claimed 16 lives since 1910, returned after a two-year hiatus due to COVID-19 restrictions.
Hundreds of runners, mostly men and some from around the world, frantically ran ahead and alongside six fighting bulls as the beasts charged through the cobblestone streets of this northern city.
The run ends at Pamplona’s bullring, where later in the day the bulls are killed by professional bullfighters.
Tens of thousands of visitors come to the festival, which starred in Ernest Hemingway’s 1926 novel The Sun Also Rises.