looks like covering their ass from an investigation came fast..... Probe: track didn't cause luger's death - 2010 Olympics - Yahoo! Sports
thats the chance you take when you lie on a washboard going 90mph. they know the risks going in. sure its a fast track. sure they need to do everything to make it as safe as possible. they probably have. no need to blame anyone because the dude impaled himself. shiits gonna happen especially in individual sports.
It's as stupid as that goddamn French underpass that Princess Diana died in--a row of immovable pillars immediately adjacent to a fast lane with no guardrail. That underpass if it was in America would have a prominent guardrail all along it and the car would have slid to a safer stop than a 100-G instant stop. That row of pillars along the luge run in Canada should be boarded up with plywood before anyone else uses the course. Then an out of control slider would careen off of it instead of sustaining a 100-G head impact. Are there any safety engineers in French-speaking countries?
i agree with red. people are gonna get ejected from the track, they cant design it so that pillars are extended away from the track or even so that there is a flat platform with no obstructions? this seems to be a failure of design. human error? cmon. thats like saying a nascar crash is human error. yeah, humans caused it but it is an inevitable part of the sport and you have to prepare for it. and on the fastest track ever made? crazy bad design. and lord have mercy, that video is brutal. it seems like you can design really safe tracks, like supermoto tracks with no obstructions. guys crash superbikes at 100 mph and just slide forever and walk it off no problem.
Site of the Luge Crash - Graphic - NYTimes.com look at that course! a 180 hairpin at the bottom, when dudes are going 90? how could they expect anything else but death.
I personally saw 20 people go down that luge run blazing fast with no mishaps. The issue is athletes that don't have proper training to run a course like this. The Olympics are supposed to be for the best but you have these countries sending guys who aren't properly prepared. Yes this course is pushing the envelope but that spot the dude crashed in is not a spot where crashes happened in training and testing. The top riders ran this course all week with no problem.
plus it was in his head. Luger who died told father he was terrified of Whistler track - Fourth-Place Medal - 2010 Olympics Blog - Yahoo! Sports
Its goes to forseeablity. The bank on that last curve should have been higher,LIKE IT IS NOW. With those steel beams right next to the turn that was an accident waiting to happen. I know its a dangerous sport but surely that could have been designed better.
some dude on nbc last night said a luger died (while luging) the week before it first became an olympic event. **** happens. old news.
