Thousands of people attended the parade and were lined up to watch the annual event which featured 8,000 performers from all over the world, including dancers, acrobats, cheerleaders and marching bands.
The parade was hosted by the Lord Mayor of Westminster, but the event was brought to a standstill when a white horse that was pulling a carriage suddenly collapsed in the middle of Waterloo Place.
The carriage drivers tried to help the animal after it fell to the ground. One witness, Fran Perrow described the scene as ‘very distressing,’ writing on Twitter that the horse had been stressed by the crowd and marching bands – and had reared up before getting its legs caught in the harness and falling to the ground.
She said the horse had been down for around five minutes and that the response to free the creature had been ‘very slow.’ ‘Horse down for 5 minutes, very slow response to free it, but up now and out of the parade,’ she wrote. Another Twitter user added: ‘I did enjoy most of the parade but found it quite upsetting to see horses and donkeys taking part, some of them were quite stressed.
‘They should most definitely not be there, is not a place for animals! Hope the horse is fine :’(‘ The 32nd parade themed Showtime was shown around the world to 600 TV stations in a mammoth satellite airing and was said to be the biggest annual outside-broadcast in Britain.
Britain’s legendary ski jumper Eddie Edwards was tempted out of retirement to perform more death-defying heroics for the parade. The event attracted over 500,000 people. The free, family-orientated spectacle, featured around 8,000 performers from numerous and over the last 32 years. The event raised a spectacular £2million for charities across the capital.
The parade featured 21 marching bands from the USA and 15 from London boroughs, 1,000 cheerleaders, giant inflatable’s, horses, donkeys, vintage vehicles-pomp, circumstance and thrills galore.
The parade started around 12 pm on Piccadilly near Green Park Station and headed to Piccadilly Circus, before ending at Parliament Square around 3.30pm.
