Beggs Father Thanks Sons After Horse Accident

By LeAnne Taylor, The News On 6

BEGGS, OK -- Working around animals, you just never know what might happen. One rural Beggs resident knows that all too well.

Ted Noland says a recent accident with a horse has taught him a whole new level of respect and has given him a new appreciation for his sons.

Ted Noland will tell you, he's blessed. He's got a wonderful family, a 40-acre ranch and gets to do what he loves: training horses.

But in late April Noland almost lost it all. He'd gone to this pasture to work on the hooves of a new horse when the lead mare, Blue, went after it.

"She turned and whirled and kicked me right in the face and I went down in the fetal position on the ground. I mean face down and I was holding my face in my hands, screaming," said Ted Noland.

Twelve-year-old Ian Noland called to his 16-year-old brother Phillip, and they raced to their dad side.

"My first thought was what was broken and where do I need to get him first," said Phillip Noland.

The boys got towels and ice, got their dad to the truck and called an ambulance and then called mom.

"When Ian called me, the full message I got was 'Mom, Dad's been kicked in the face by a horse, EMSA's on its way, I gotta go.' Click. And that was it. I had no clue whether he was dead. He did say it was by Blue so I knew the power that was there," said Karen Noland.

Ted was taken by air ambulance to a Tulsa hospital with most of the bones in his face broken.

So how were these boys able to manage all that?

"I have no clue, I would say that was a God thing," said Ian Noland.

"That has been a true miracle that I have been almost without pain through this entire process, when you consider my jaw was broken from here all the way across over my nose back over the top of my nose, two places up here. My entire cheek was crushed where they had to put replace the eye socket with titanium, put two silicone implants. Man, that should hurt like the Dickens," said Ted Noland.

Even though Ted has one more surgery, the doctors have cleared him to work with the horses.

"My first words to him when I knew he was gonna be ok were, 'what were you thinking. You know better than that,'" said Karen Noland.

Nobody in the family blames Blue. They say she's a good horse who was only going on instinct. And Ted's learned a lot during this ordeal especially about his boys.

"Without a doubt, they're my heroes. I've always been very proud of them and they are something else," said Ted Noland.

When I asked both boys about being a hero, neither one was very comfortable with that. They said they just did what they had to do, to make sure their dad was okay.

An interesting side note, their mom Karen, sent me a picture of the boys for the Six in the Morning family photo segment, wanting to give them recognition. But once we heard about their bravery, we had to do the story.