Competitors worst fears were confirmed earlier today when Georgian’s Olympian Nodar Kumaritashvili died in his last training session in the luge. The devastating news is set to cast a heavy shadow over the Winter Olympics opening ceremony and the remainder of the Games in Vancouver, Canada. Kumaritashvili’s fatal crash happened during his sixth and final training session when his sled hit the inside of the last turn sending his body into the air and over a concrete wall while his sled continued down the ice.
The 21-year-old smashed head first into a metal pole after he was thrown off his sled, which was travelling at an estimated 90mph, and was later pronounced dead after immediate resuscitation attempts and doctors efforts at a local hospital had failed.
The dangers of luge are widely renown an
d those that take part know the risks involved but the dangers were further increased at this year’s Winter Olympics. Speeds at Whistler Sliding Centre, the venue for this year’s luge competition, have been worryingly high since the track opened last year with one luger hitting a top speed of 95.65 mph and now Kumaritashvili’s speed of an estimated 90mph are both faster than the recorded World Record speed of 86.6 mph held by US slider Tony Benshoof in 2001.
Competitors raised concerns over the safety of the track and last night Australian luger Hannah Campbell Pegg voiced her own worries to reporters after her practice session.
She said: “I think they are pushing it a little too much. 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.”
As I nervously watched the crash on huffingtonpost.com I had to re-watch the incident three times because of the sheer speed that Kumaritashvili’s sled was going at. And as the opening ceremony gets under way tonight there will be many angry people in Vancouver that will be calling on the luge competition to be scrapped – not only because of the death but because of the how dangerous the track is.
The one big annoyance for me if the luge is to be cancelled is that it takes such a dramatic and tragic experience to happen for a decision to be made. The concerns and issues had been previously raised by experts involved yet it is left to having to be proven and when it involves a sport as dangerous as the luge the proof – which needs to be big in order to have an impact and spark a decision change by those at the top – will inevitable result in a death.
1 comment:
Nodar Kumaritashvili’s death is a tragedy! Luge looks like such a neat sport, but also very dangerous at the same time. His death will cast a pall over these Olympic Games. The safety of the sport definitely needs to be addressed appropriately and immediately.
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