Georgian Olympic Luger dead after practice crash

[mandingo]

The Link



Warning... Graphic video:


The Link

Horrible.

I'm certainly no winter sports expert, but in the auto racing that I watch regularly, track design with exposed poles where cars or drivers can leave the track and hit them like that went by the wayside long ago.

 

[Bill in Sinton]

 

[led224]

This is just terrible. I feel so sorry for his family, friends and teammates.

Australia's Hannah Campbell-Pegg had this to say about the track last night after she nearly crashed:
"To what extent are we just little lemmings that they just throw down a track and we're crash-test dummies? I mean, this is our lives."

Makes you wonder about the track.

 

[2222Horn]

Superfast track and the Canadians are limiting practice runs. Recipe for disaster.

 

[longhorn_melissa]

This is probably opening a huge can of worms, but where does the media draw the line with what footage they show?

ABC world news showed this video during the 5:30 show and they did offer a warning, but geez. This is someone's child and we're watching him die. I don't think I would want footage of my family member's horrible death broadcast across the world.

 

[TexasRx]

How sad... a life taken right before one of the greatest days in their life. I admit that I teared up watching the Georgian athletes walk in with out him.

 

[overseasbbfan1]

This is very tragic. Apparently this track is the fastest in the world, and by a wide margin. Some of the best lugers in the world have apparently had crashes here also and safety concerns have been raised previously. According to reports most tracks flatten out at a certain stage but this one keeps dropping and leaves zero margin for error. I simply don't understand why the steel poles were not padded; I expect we are going to see a lot of changes to this track before competition begins.

 

[mandingo]

He was going between 70 and 80 mph. Padding the walls really wouldn't help that much at that speed. The deceleration alone would likely kill the rider. What they need there is a barrier to keep the rider from ever leaving the tube and crossing over into the area where the steel beams are...a vertical plexiglass wall extension or just a much taller wall would do it. That wouldn't eliminate any potential for injury, but that's not what we're looking for here. If you hit one of those beams with your upper body, it's guaranteed death.

It's amazing to me that they could just ignore or not notice that obvious of a safety design flaw at the fastest track in the world.

Crazy.

Anyone had to be able to see that was a catastrophe waiting to happen. If there were something similar in motorsport these days, they would just walk away and not race.

 

[mandingo]

They're going to raise the wall and change the ice.

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2010/olym...d=si_topstories

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[ctrl+alt+del]

I have not, and will not watch this. This is truly sad. Before I had children of my own I would have probably watched it 1000 times...

 

[ImissWallyPryor]

Mandingo is correct... padding would not have helped. Yet, like the officials said, it's the luger's fault.

 

[OrangeBlooded]

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