How dangerous is skiing?
Saturday March 21, 2009 - Email this article to a friend

This winter in Austria alone 29 people have died, 7 of them in collisions with other skiers or snowboarders. It’s estimated that 5,500 skiers will suffer serious head injuries on the Austrian slopes.

Approximately 10,000 British people are injured per year.  With around 1.3m people from the UK going skiing each winter that means 1 out of every 130 people sustains an injury.

Most of the injuries are minor bumps, cuts and grazes but there are many serious injuries and deaths. 

“The most common injury to skiers is damage to the knees as the stiff boots transfer the forces to the knee joint,” says consultant surgeon, Jonathan Bell. “It used to be broken bones but not any more.  Injuries to the head are fortunately much less common, but they do seem to get a deal of publicity.”

Spinal injuries are also fairly rare but with the growth in people going into snow parks the risks have been raised and a spinal injury has potentially very serious consequences.

An increasing number of people now wear back protection.

For snowboarders injuries to the wrists and shoulders are most common.

Not the best way to come off the mountainSo, why the high numbers of injuries?

In part it is because the equipment has changed with the new carving skis allowing people to feel more stable as they go faster and it means people tend to ski across the slope rather than down it so they have blind spots.

The vastly improved lift systems also mean that more people are on the slopes at any one time.

Very few lifts are built into new ski areas in the Alps, but rather the old ones are replaced and new lifts that transport people much quicker are installed.

Our content editor at PlanetSKI , James Cove, has his own theories. 

“People seem to have less respect for the mountain environment as it is turned into one giant playground.  Of course they are on holiday and should enjoy themselves but skiing and snowboarding are inherently dangerous and should be treated with a healthy degree of  respect and common sense,” he tells us.  “As someone who skis pretty much every day during the winter I guess I see at least 10 injuries per week and a day never goes by when I don’t see people doing stupid things that could result in injury.”

This winter wearing a helmet, or not, is a hot topic of conversation.  In parts of Italy and Lower Austria it is compulsory for children to wear one and many ski schools insist on it too.

Natasha Richardson was not wearing a helmet at the time of  her accident and it is sure to fuel the debate.

See the interview below with British skier, Mervyn Fletcher, who bough a helmet for the first time earlier this winter.

 

The sales of ski helmets has shot up this winter with Snow and Rock in the UK reporting a 15% increase in sales and some shops in the Alps running out of stock.

It’s difficult to assess whether injuries are going up or whether we just hear more about them.

Speed limit in Grindelwald, SwitzerlandResorts all have the 10 point FIS code on safety displayed around the ski area, but few people actually read it.

Some resorts are introducing speed linits on certain runs and slow ski areas but they are not policed in the main so people break the rules with impunity.

Here at PlanetSKI we believe the best way to protect yourself is to have the right equipment that is correctly set, always ski or snowboard in control, keep fit, obey all the rules about safety and which runs are open and which runs are closed and above all when skiing around use that commodity that is not seen as often as it should be -  common sense.

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