Features

Against All Odds

 

Tony Jardine Miraculously Survives a Near Fatal Kick

 

It was a pretty normal day, that July in 2007 when Tony Jardine nearly died. The champion mounted shooter and horse trainer was at his southern Idaho ranch, helping out a friend, as he often did.  In this case, he was taking care of a high-dollar Thoroughbred yearling, treating its serious leg injury.  Sure, the horse was pretty wild and mean—almost crazy.  But Tony had a lifetime of experience with horses of all kinds.  He was a pro, and he was taking no chances.

 

All it took was a second.  The animal got him up against a strong fence—and then it kicked him in the gut.  Very hard.  Jardine’s paramedic training told him he was in bad shape, that he might not come out of this alive. 

 

The ironic part is that Tony Jardine, who got into trouble while helping out a pal, was going to have to rely on friends (and some higher powers) to get his life back—and to find the truly important things in that life.

 

Young gun

Some folks are just born with the cowboy spirit, and such was the case with Tony Jardine. Both parents were teachers, not riders. Yet, from the start, Jardine’s passion was horses, and even as a little boy he was characterized by a special fortitude and determination. By the time he turned eight, he saved enough money from little odd jobs to buy some “pawn shop tack” and his own horse—a two-year-old unbroken colt.

 

“You can imagine how that all went,” he laughs. “Green on green doesn’t work. I stuck a bit in his mouth and pulled and yanked and got bucked off a lot but eventually, somehow, he made a nice horse and I could rope on him and everything.”

 

By 16, he was working the sale yard—and got a break. “That’s when I learned to get pretty good at sorting and handling cows,” he explains. “A guy that raised Docs Hickory horses saw me, thought I had some talent, provided me horses, and offered to pay for my ‘education’—meaning horsemanship clinics. I was making $3.45 an hour and those clinics cost about $400 per weekend. Those opportunities allowed me to ride with World Champion trainers and legends including Les Vogt, Ray Hunt, Tom Dorrance and more.”

 

At the same time, Jardine was honing his gun skills.  “I’ve been a shooting enthusiast my whole life,” he says. “We lived on a farm in southern Idaho where we could just go out and shoot, and I got a single shot .22 rifle for my sixth birthday. I shot the barrel out of it by the time I was 10.”

 

Mounted Shooter

Jardine’s clinic “education” helped launch a successful training and show career: reiners, cow horses, ropin’ horses and rodeo broncs.  Along the trail, he met his wife Marianne (“she’s a better roper than me”). The couple and their three kids (seven-year old Garet, five-year-old Riley and nine-month old Ryan) enjoy ropin’, ridin’ and of course, mounted shooting, which Jardine first tried in 1996.  As usual, when he set his sights on something, success followed quickly.

 

“It was a lot different then,” he explains. “The ‘96 National Championships was actually my first shoot. It was a two-edged sword, because at that time, they watched you shoot, evaluated you, and gave you a number. They said I was a number 3, so I had to shoot in that division. You could only become a 5 if you had won a National or World title. Well, I won at my first shoot/finals (team division) so I became a 5 the same day,” he laughs.

 

But Jardine wasn’t just a standout shooter (he has five World and Reserve titles and four National titles to his credit).  He’s been instrumental in the sport’s growth by helping secure major sponsors like Wrangler and by becoming a respected instructor and horse trainer.

 

The Jardines raised Costa (El Costa Prom, owned by World Champion shooter Annie Bianco-Ellett), and have a small breeding program with a few royally-bred mares and two accomplished stallions; Rawhides Litl Peppy (a reiner, cow horse and roper) and Hickorys Dry Chex, a big red roan stud (by Costa) who cuts, ropes, runs barrels and is a CMSA world champion shooting horse and record holder.        

 

And with all that, he still has a “day” (and night) job of being a firefighter and EMT/paramedic.  Miraculously, his medical knowledge and competitive cool head would combine in an amazing and unforeseen way.

 

Fighter
July 2007, friends of Jardine had a high-dollar Thoroughbred yearling.  The colt had a severe leg injury, so they asked Jardine to try packing it with the Silver Lining Herbs he uses.

 

“They brought him over after chasing him into their trailer. This colt was big, about 900 pounds already. He’d never been handled which made things really fun,” he remarks.  “I was careful, and I finally got him cornered and tied and got the leg packed. So I did chores, came back to untie him, and he set back on the rope and pulled like crazy, trying to break loose. I stood at his shoulder with my hand on it; I was in a safe place.”

 

Usually, a horse quickly figures out that if he quits pulling, the pressure (both halter and hand) disappears.  Instead, the colt got madder and things escalated.  Still pulling, he also began to pin his ears and bare his teeth in anger. Then, he really zeroed in.

 

“All at once, he jumped forward and sideways right at me and mashed my left side into the fence rails. I thought okay, he’ll quit sooner or later. But he kept it up until he wallered my back up against the fence. Then, he jumped forward again and kicked me so hard in the mid-section his leg almost went right through me,” Jardine says. “My six-year-old son was the only one home. The way it hurt, I figured my spleen was ruptured. Two broken ribs were sticking out of the skin, but I couldn’t feel them due to the internal pain. My belly started distending; I was bleeding out internally. I sent my son inside; I didn’t want him to see me die,” Jardine recalls.

 

But this is where the story takes some remarkable turns.

 

Still on his feet, Jardine didn’t panic or get nervous.  As a paramedic, he knew that could kill him.  First, he called a neighbor and asked them to take care of his son. Next, he started for the truck to drive to the hospital. But at that same moment, a concrete worker hired for the day pulled in unexpectedly to drop off materials.

 

“He did panic,” Jardine laughs, “and I asked him if he could please drive me to the hospital.”

 

And the remarkable turns continued.  His wife was already at the hospital for her pre-natal appointment and met them at the truck. A good friend—also an EMT–“just happened” to be passing by an emergency door that could only open from the inside; it provided a short cut. She saw him coming, put him in a wheelchair, flew past check-in (no time for paperwork) and headed straight for the MRI room and started shouting orders. In the midst of it all, a “brave” ER doctor “cut me open right there and clamped my arteries,” Jardine says—another life saving move, because Jardine’s internal organs had been entirely detached from those arteries.

 

Repairs included removing his intestines, cutting out the dead parts of his pancreas and re-attaching the living sections (an experimental process that ultimately saved 30-percent of the organ), and removing his left kidney and half of his right. Then, his intestines were “stuffed back in.”

 

“I was there 17 days, four or five in intensive care, lost 40 pounds, and nearly died several times,” he says. But he was still alive, in spite of everything.

 

The comeback.

 

Rehab was tough.  He had to “jiggle the intestines into place,” and that required him to be upright.  This is where an amazing friendship came in.

 

“Four times a day, my buddy Sander Elquist came in and put both my arms around his shoulders and carried me around like a back pack,” Jardine says, which helped the intestines settle in and work properly. And when they sent him home, ““He came to the house for a week and helped me to bed, the bathroom, whatever I needed. He dedicated three weeks of his life to me; it’s the truest form of friendship you could ever imagine. He and his wife were always there for us.”

 

His mounted shooting and rodeo friends did their part. Fund raisers popped up nationally, helping to pay medical expenses.  Others offered to take care of the kids.  “People will say call if I can help, but few call you and offer something like that,” Jardine remarks.

 

But he did his own part, too, determined to get well.  Doctors told him it would be a year before he was back in the saddle. Wrong. Four months after he was hurt, on November 5, he roped “in horrible pain” at a benefit for him and his family.

 

Today, a few complications remain, but as usual, nothing he wants to dwell on.  He’d rather tell about the blessings.

 

“Before the accident, I was working too hard, and not spending enough family time. In my mind, if I rode until 2 a.m., I was doing the right thing for the family,” he says. “This was a wake up call. I almost died taking on another project. I almost never saw my nine-month old son turn his head and smile.  I coached my older son’s flag football team this year, and I saw his first home run in baseball. Normally, I probably wouldn’t have had time—I would have been slopping horses. Not now. I’m home more, and I’ve changed my program around.”

 

Most importantly, he shares these lessons with others. He’s spoken at doctors’ conferences and at cowboy church services.  He shares the pain as well as the joy.  “I should have died, but God’s timing was amazing, and I talk about that. I don’t know the reason I’ve been saved yet, but I know I spend more family time now than I ever did, so I’ve shared that,” he says. “And I talk about my buddy who carried me like a backpack and all the other help from friends. It’s important to do our best to be that kind of friend too,” Jardine says.

 

So today, Tony continues with his shooting horses, breeding services and private instruction (he maintains a website at jardineperformancehorses.com).  But the events at his Idaho ranch, now 18 months in the past, which nearly killed him, instead brought about a different perspective, a new set of priorities, and a renewed appreciation for life.  And a deeper understanding of just what friendship means.

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