Moose Knocks Musher Out of Race Lead : Iditarod: The animal charged four-time winner Rick Swenson’s team, injuring one dog.

A moose knocked four-time winner Rick Swenson out of the lead of the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race today, stomping through his team and slowing him enough to allow defending champion Joe Runyan to move in front.

Swenson had left McGrath hours before anyone else, but he turned back after the run-in with the moose and waited for other racers to try their luck with the animal.

A veterinarian checked out one of Swenson’s injured dogs, which was pronounced fit.

Nine other racers set out before dawn--none reporting any more moose--but Swenson waited for daylight before returning to the trail, and that dropped him to 10th place.

Swenson said he saw the moose ahead of him at the first river portage about a mile out of McGrath and was trying to cross the river ahead of it.

“She was on the river,” Swenson said. “It was just one of those normal races to see who would get there first.”

Swenson said he had hoped the moose would keep going, but it turned into his team, trampling some of the dogs and turning them back on the sled.

While Swenson waited, the nine who set out included Runyan, Lavon Barve and three-time winner Susan Butcher. Runyan was first into the next checkpoint 23 miles away at Takotna and headed on to Ophir, a ghost town left from turn-of-the-century gold mining days.

Officials in McGrath rerouted the race through town because of deep snow along the usual Kuskokwim River route.

On Wednesday, Butcher came upon seventh-placed Tim Osmar as he fired shots into the air to scare off a buffalo that would not leave the trail.

“Susan Butcher showed up in her red (snow) suit and that’s what did it,” Osmar said. “She scared the buffalo right on.”

Mushers are encountering some of the 800 animals that freely roam Alaska in five herds.

In all, 18 of the 68 teams still in the endurance run from Anchorage to Nome had pulled into McGrath by 6:30 a.m. today.