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Daredevil sport Cavagnoud is only latest high-profile skiiing casualty
LONDON (Reuters) -- Regine Cavagnoud's death on Wednesday following a crash in a training session is the latest in a string of serious accidents to hit the sport of skiing. The French world super-G champion had suffered severe head and internal injuries after she rammed into a trainer on the Pitz Valley glacier in Austria. Austria's Ulrike Maier died in 1994 when she lost control and crashed during a World Cup downhill in the German resort of Garmisch-Partenkirchen in January. The former world champion broke her neck in the 105-kph crash as she fell on the back of her head near a mound of snow piled up to protect a timing post.
In 1991, Austrian Gernot Reinstadler died when he broke his pelvis and suffered massive internal injuries in a crash during training for a World Cup downhill in Wengen. Austrian Peter Wirnsberger II died from injuries sustained during a fall during free skiing in Austria in 1992. Top Swedish skier Tomas Fogdoe was left paralysed after a training accident in 1995. Russian downhiller Tatiana Lebedeva collided with an American race official in a high-speed crash at the 1996 World Championships in Sierra Nevada, with both suffering broken legs. Downhill champion Picabo Street of the United States was in a horrific crash at Crans Montana in 1998 that shattered her left femur and shredded knee ligaments. Canadian ski legend Dave Irwin was left in a coma after suffering critical head injuries in March this year, when he fell during a training run for an extreme skiing competition at the Sunshine Village resort near Banff, Alberta. Former Olympic ski champion Bill Johnson had to have brain surgery after he crashed in a comeback race at the age of 40 earlier this year, on the eve of the U.S. Alpine skiing championships at Big Mountain. French skier Adrien Duvillard was seriously injured in a training crash for a World Cup downhill in Wengen, Switzerland, in 1997, after losing control on the final turn of the Lauberhorn course, the same spot where Gernot Reinstadler was killed six years earlier. Others have died or suffered serious injuries in traffic accidents. Austria's most prolific giant slalom winner Hermann Maier is currently out of competition after a motorcycle accident in the summer left him nursing a compound fracture to his leg. Austria's chief ski jumping coach Alois Lipburger, 44, was killed in a car accident in Germany in March this year. Ski jumper Martin Hoellwarth and former overall World Cup champion Andreas Widhoelzl escaped with minor injuries. Austrian World Cup ski racer Richard Kroell was killed in a traffic accident when his car crashed into an oncoming bus in the Tyrol in 1996. Austrian triple world champion Rudi Nierlich was killed in a car crash only three months after defending his giant slalom gold medal in Saalbach at the age of 25 in 1991. The career of Italy's Kristian Ghedina -- the most successful World Cup downhiller in Italian ski history -- almost ended in 1991 when he spent two days in a coma after a car crash.
Copyright 2003 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved.
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