Are you the new owner of an air vest? A lot of times people are very concerned about the sound that a vest makes when it deploy, so they will ask me, “Should I do a test deployment right next to my horse or do a bunch of them to desensitize my horse and get them used to the sound?”
The reality is the sound being an issue is more of a human construct and not an equine construct. The horses have no idea what's about to come. And frankly, it happens so quickly that they don't really have time to react.
So my philosophy is that if you start setting it off next to them, you are teaching them that there is something to be afraid of. Just let things happen naturally. I think you'll find that if you are falling and if your horse is having a reaction, they are probably reacting more so to the fact that you are not where you're supposed to be in the entire set of events that are going on. It's usually not the vest specifically that they are spooking at.
If the vest is keeping you from serious injury, who cares if your horse spooks at it? They're probably going to spook away from you. I don't let that be a deciding factor, and I encourage my clients not to be worried about the sound either.
