A team from Animals' Angels monitors the A14 highway near Bologna during the day. It is hot. The thermometer rises to 37 °C. We hope that no animal transporters drive by at these temperatures. But in fact, many do drive. One of these trucks is transporting lambs from Romania and is on its way to a large slaughterhouse in Bari. The Italian highways are full of traffic jams these days because of the tourists. As we feared, our poor lambs are also stuck in one of the endless queues in the sun. The truck soon turns into an oven, the thermometer shows 39 °C outside temperature.
The lambs breathe accelerated, have no way out and do not find the slightest relief. Despite the hot weather, too many animals are loaded. The water is turned off and because of the overcrowding not all of them could have reached the waterers anyway. The only relief is the cool of the night, but there is still a long way to go.
When the traffic jam is over, we decide not to call the police to have the van sanctioned, because stopping for hours would be an additional torture for the lambs. We can only help Rosie. Her little legs are stuck in the gap between one of the loading levels and the back door. She can no longer move. We will alert the driver who will free Rosie.
We will ask the relevant authorities to investigate the case and ensure that the animals are no longer transported in the heat.
