RIP..

ok this is in bad but I will admit I laughed (and felt bad after)..
anyways found this on the Joe Rogan board

im not a rocket scientist but wouldnt higher walls and a net that could withstand luge speeds or something that is designed to keep the lugers INSIDE the track seem more safe? maybe it wont make a difference but anything is better than going straight into a concrete wall @ 100mph...

http://img708.imageshack.us/img708/2...70522qvpxg.jpg

That's just horrible. Wasn't there tests done on this track before? Why are there concrete poles after a high speed turn? Making it padded doesn't help. If they crash, they will break their neck.
I don't think inexperience was much of a factor, since how can you really control at 144km/h in a practice run?
The designers of the track should have made it slower and safer. Maybe put safety netting and removing the concrete poles.

whats worse than going down a frozen slide at 100mph wearing nothing?

doing the exact same thing except going headfirst.

these 2 sports belong in the winter xgames not the olympics

It was probably in bad taste, but im heartless.

I agree on putting netting or putting higher barriers, but removing the poles would prob do more harm in terms of structure.
Like others said, the designers probably done many calculations, designs and test simulations to meet the requirments and regulations of the track.
I think inexperience was a big factor, along with many others, like chance and luck. Like the others said, one big freak accident.
Why would we make something slower and safer when the world is going the other way? Technolgy is a major factor. If they cared a bout slower/safer, they would pad thenselves up and use dull skates so going down the hill.
Maybe everything was so technically advanced (board, clothing, track) that the average luger couldn't handle it, but then that goes again with experience and luck/chance.

It is just the nature of luge. I'm surprised there arn't more deaths.
But now the utilitarian view is, since his death, others will learn from it making it safer hopefully.

RIP. It was pretty hard to watch when they showed it.
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Many people have tested the track and people have gone over 150 km/h. He didn't have to 144 km/h he could have gone slower but he wanted the fastest time in the practice session.

rip, imo they should postpone the use of the luge track

I see that most ppl here dont have any physics knowledge at all... whether that was a side wall, or a concrete beam, or pillows he would have died. IMPULSE know it? FORCE/TIME(s)

apparently, they're blaming the athlete for not following the right line through the course. whatever weight shifting they do can't possibly offer such a precise amount of control that they can change lines if they fuck up a corner exit.

they're fucking ice sleds, not F1 cars, you insensitive safety officials.

sure... make the walls higher, just so the next athlete can now safely do an assgrind 180 into the pole right after that one. i guess that gives the next dead athlete style points.

i sure hope they make the safety wall reach the roof to catch anyone that can't take a proper line through the ice.

I agree. Forget the paddings, he needed more time to slow down. He went from 140km/hr to 0 in 1sec. His heart, lungs, brain, vessels, etc all got knocked out of place when he smacked at the wall with so many g's.

^ i would agree
netting/fences would just cut into him considering the speed
and im assuming the pillars were also designed to help hold some weight, cuz a human body flying around a corning at 140+ km/h would exert A LOT of force onto the track
RIP

Unless　they totally cancel the luge event and tear down the track, you are wrong. This was a freak accident caused by a mistake in an event he knew was deadly going in. All the bullshit here and on news sites making up stories as if the athletes were warning people this would happen is just bullshit.

Um, pillows would totally help. Would you rather jump off a building onto a layer of pillows or a concrete floor? If forced to choose I'd take 1 layer over 0 any day.

Since when is impulse F/t? Last time I checked it's F*t. You might want to pay more attention in physics class. ;) Technically it's the integral of F(t)dt but this is getting beyond highschool physics.

The deceleration is actually pretty crazy. 143.3km/h = 39.8m/s. Assuming his helmet has 3cm of padding and the pillar didn't flex, the acceleration on the guy's head is 26408m/s^2, or 2694.7Gs. :eek: Your brain would turn to goo. His head would reach a full stop (assuming he doesn't bounce) in 0.0015s.

They really should pad those things and raise the walls to be honest. Might not reduce the injuries by too much but keeping them inside the track would be a whole lot safer. Also the extra 0.05s or whatever deceleration time provided by a pad may have prevented this guy's death. Then again, nobody ever anticipated someone flying out. Design oversight if anything. Hopefully the raised wall will prevent another fatality at this point. And yes, they do keep walls low on purpose. Not just so people can see better, but also to minimize costs. Concrete isn't free you know.

Upon closer look, his head never hit anything until it hit that pole.

They have some control, otherwise victory would purely depend on the initial acceleration at the start. I think he just over pushed that run... and sadly, it cost his life.



This can be partial blame on both sides. I assume the designers had made the track how all tracks have been designed in previous years. (I'm not 100% sure did other tracks in previous years had poles so close or not, or were they padded or not.) But also, the luger himself went too fast, his own error.

Although common sense would tell you that putting poles so close like that is not very smart. An Engineer may be able to calculate what angle to make the turns according to the expected speeds of a luger, and the size and strength of the colums (poles) to use for supporting the track, but their main concern probably isn't going to be "WHAT IF's" for lugers that make mistakes.

A higher wall would have helped. The way he fell off, he would have hit the wall and just rolled back into the track (he wouldn't have flew out to the other side). Probably still injured, but death would have been unlikely. Another thing they could have done is to make the base of the pole farther away by making them diagonal. So the top point is still the same, but the bottom can be farther away from the track. That may have helped a bit.

I'm not a luger myself, so I don't know the techniques on what to do if something goes wrong. While exiting that corner, he knew he was already in trouble, as you can see both his hands were not holding the luge anymore. In other words, he bailed. I'm thinking would it have been any better if he had decided to hang on to dear life... He probably didn't expect to go out of the track if he decided to let go of the luge.

He had already "crashed" earlier prior to that. And I think it said over a dozen other lugers had wiped out on this track. I don't know what's the rate for previous years. Is this common to have that many accidents? All of them walked away without injuries... It's unfortunate that this one wasn't so lucky.



Are they planning to do anything about this now for safety?
And how will this effect other lugers in the actual games? It's only natural to be a bit hesitant of pushing it as hard as they can, knowing someone has died by doing so.

After the investigation, they said it was pilot error that lead to the crash.

They made some changes to the track. I think they raised the wall.
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I believe a higher wall could have led to the lugers pushing either harder cuz theres more room to go

Higher walll, and now men start at the women's start. Starting from the women's start they loose 2 turns and about 10 stories of height.

One good idea someone came up with was to plexiglass the side of the track.. people can still watch.. Cameras can still tape and it would keep him in the track..
One thing I dont like is they are talking about putting speed limits in place. If they do that they should just remove the event from the Olympics. They dont have speed limits in any other events. Its all about pushing yourself to your limit. That is why this finally happened. Hell this guy was only going 144 km/h.. Someone has done over 150 km/h and survived.
If they had more time I'd say use plexiglass and then have some sorta shock absorber attached from the glass to those beams to minimize impact and then allow them to go all out..

the new NHL glass used at GM place etc. flexes like 2-3 feet outwards on impact

i dont know if a big hit is the same impact at somone hitting it at 140km/h but could be an idea

I'm sure they can figure something out. With a shock system in place it would absorb some of the impact. I'm sure the NHL glass would do just fine..

Safety nets and High walls with line to show which is track and which is safety zone is a good idea

as for the nets,
theres gotta be room for the net to give out for the athlete in order for it to work, plus the amount of force would be tremendous, especially if you can hit 5G on that course

I have a tremendous amount of respect for the other luge athletes. Being able to run on a course you know someone has died on, I don't think I could do it. You gotta wonder what they're thinking as they come up to that bend in the track...