Trapper Stampede Cancelled

The Trapper Stampede, the annual rodeo sponsored by Northwest College, has gone from being postponed this year to being cancelled.

The Trapper Stampede is an annual event that usually kicks off the college rodeo season. But this year, the rodeo was postponed from its normally scheduled time, the first weekend in September, due to the outbreak of an equine virus.

VSV, or Vesicular Stomatitis, is a generally non-fatal virus that affects horses and other livestock, and was first detected in Park County in late August. In part, because this outbreak has not subsided, the Trapper Stampede has been cancelled this year.

Becky Crump and her husband Del Nose coach the Northwest College Rodeo Team. She says the combination of the virus and the threat of the approaching winter storm caused them to make the decision to cancel this year’s event.

Crump says that in order to make up for the cancellation of the Trapper Stampede, two other rodeos in Havre and in Dillon will extend their events by a day – that way the student athletes have a chance to make up points they might have earned at the Cody rodeo.

Crump adds that this is the first time in 22 years the Northwest College rodeo has been cancelled, but says they wanted to take no chances that rodeo participants might be caught on the roads during the forecasted winter storm event.

She notes they are disappointed, but looking forward to next year.