Traveling The Globe With Moni Maker
"They have containers, which are small, make-shift box stalls," Roman said. "They're pretty small. Moni Maker was a very tall horse and she was pretty cramped in those things. I had to keep her relaxed in that thing."
The airplane box-stall is set on a platform, which has wheels. Once Moni Maker would arrive in Europe, usually in Amsterdam or Milan, Italy, she would have another two to three-hour wait in that same box-stall.
"In Amsterdam, Moni Maker could never go out of the container," Roman said. "They have a big cargo hanger there, and the allowed me to take her in there. I cleaned the whole area where she was situated for those couple of hours, because the whole hanger was full of all kinds of animals in transit. We didn't want her to catch any kind of virus there."
A trans-Atlantic flight for a horse like Moni Maker cost her owners upwards of $15,000.
"The security is very tight," Roman said. "I brought my own disinfectant, since I'm the one that dealt with the officials. Since I traveled so much with Moni Maker, many of the officials got to know me and I had a good relationship with them. That is always good to do, because sometimes they'd let me walk her around a little more than they would normally."
Roman said during the actual flight he never left Moni Maker's side. Many horses will panic or become very nervous at take-off and landing, because of the tilt of the aircraft is something they have never experienced before. Moni Maker never caused a problem, Roman said. Besides the trans-Atlantic flight, the horse also had to endure flying from locale to locale throughout Europe in order to compete, as well as shipping by horse van.
"Once we flew from Naples to Copenhagen, and when you're in Naples, that's a walk-on, walk-off area for the horses." Roman said. "In other words, unlike in Amsterdam, you actually walk the horses on and off the plane, down a ramp. So once when we had a couple of hours layover, I wanted to take Moni Maker for a walk. During the flight she had been flirting with the horse next to her, and when I tried to take her off the plane, she wanted no part of it. She was absolutely smitten with him, and he with her. So that is one scenario where I let her stay on the plane,
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