An annual bullfighting festival in Spain was canceled after all of the matadors were severely injured by the bulls.
Three matadors in the San Isidro festival in Madrid received medical treatment after they were either gored or trampled, AFP reported. One was wounded to the point where he needed a blood transfusion. It is the first time in 35 years the festival was canceled due to matador injuries.
"The festival had to be suspended...because of the gorings suffered by the three matadors," Las Ventas, the venue where the bullfight was held, said in a statement obtained by AFP. "In the 68-year history of San Isidro, two bullfights have been suspended for gorings of matadors, both in 1979."
The most seriously injured matador was David Mora, who was stabbed in the leg by the horn of a 1,172-pound bull and then tossed into the air.
"The somersault was horrific, shocking, chilling, impossible for the human to eye witness yet evident to the mind," Antonio Lorca, bullfighting correspondent for El Pais, wrote according to AFP.
Mora underwent a two-hour operation during which he received a blood transfusion, according to Maximo Garcia Padros, the venue's surgeon.
"The goring in the femoral vein placed his life in danger. If you don't act it empties like an open tap, but that's why we are here," Padros said according to AFP.
Another matador, Antonio Nazare, suffered a knee wound when a bull dragged him along the sand in the bullring, the BBC reported.
A bull then gored the third matador, Jimenez Fortes, in the right leg and pelvis. Both matadors were also hospitalized.
The San Isidro festival opens the bullfighting season in Spain each year. But the practice of bullfighting, which dates back some 4,000 years, has been on the decline as critics slam the practice as barbaric.
Spain's congress passed a measure last year that gave bullfighting cultural heritage status in an attempt to preserve the tradition, according to the BBC.
