Local news reported that the Olympic Luge accident was result of human error.

[LiberalFighter]

I call bullshit on that.

After viewing the video in my opinion they could had avoided or minimized the tragedy. The solution would had been to have the beams located further apart and away from the track.

The human error was on the part of the design not the racer.

[taterguy]

1. Well some human made an error

[XemaSab]

2. Not to mention the fact that the men are now starting further down

so as to minimize speed going into some of the turns.

[Fumesucker]

3. So you think it was deliberate? n/t

[LiberalFighter]

7. I didn't mention or suggest anything about it being deliberate.

[Fumesucker]

10. You certainly implied it wasn't an error..

Which basically leaves a deliberate act as being the answer.

[LiberalFighter]

22. The human error I was referring to and the report on the local news

was that it was the sledder's fault. That I dispute.

There have been many luge competition and spills without death.

I would consider it more than human error when it involves design without considering safety factors.

[Fumesucker]

25. That wasn't what you said in the OP..

[LiberalFighter]

28. Did you read the very last sentence of that post?

The human error was on the part of the design not the racer.

[KittyWampus]

31. I think they deliberately intended to create a fast and dangerous luge, yes.

IMO, engineering these things involves some relatively straightforward physics.

[farmout rightarm]

35. You think they designed it specifically to be dangerous?

I'm just guessing here...you are not a physicist...or an engineer...right?

[KittyWampus]

38. I think they designed it to get viewers by making it extremely fast and decided to ignore safety

measures.

Car companies have done this many times over they years.

[TexasObserver]

44. You can bet they had someone saying "it's going to be dangerous."

And someone else overruling them.

I imagine their attorneys are madly working on two fronts:

One group is focusing on the contracts with the designers, engineers, contractors and insurers. All the liability and probably the cost of defending will fall upon one or all of those people.

The other group of their lawyers is reviewing the design and constuction work files to determine what is said about safety risks, particularly any warnings of any such risk of harm. They'll want to find any documents which might hang them and start figuring out how to keep those records from being produced.

[farmout rightarm]

54. I shudder to think where we would be if the "that is dangerous" naysayers had had their way

when Wilbur and Orville built their gadget. Can you imagine someone inventing the airplane in today's society where we're taught that suing somebody is the remedy for every real or imagined risk or insult?

:grr:

[TexasObserver]

57. Then you easily shudder, and for no good reason.

Everything in your life was engineered in today's society, where you claim we are "taught that suing somebody is the remedy for every real or imagined risk or insult." That's a right wing talking point promoted by the likes of Karl Rove.

[farmout rightarm]

68. You're free to be completely wrong. I really don't appreciate being compared to K. Rove,

but if that's the best you can do...well, it's the best you can do.

[TexasObserver]

69. Where on this thread do you have a different opinion than Rove would?

Your posts are entirely consistent with Rove and the GOP.

Spend a few hours readiing up on products liability, so you at least know the progressive position and how it has evolved the past 50 years.

[farmout rightarm]

45. Sorry, that's BS that comes from irrational hatred of companies.

No CEO or bean-counting department would ever adopt policies that would knowingly kill their customers.
Anyone who thinks that is just goofy.

[TexasObserver]

50. You do not seem to be aware of the history of product liability.

Many CEOs and many bean counters do exactly what you said they would not do. They adopt policies that they know will result in a certain number of serious injuries and/or death, based upon the costs of paying for such deaths or injuries compared to the costs of preventing them.

Anyone who doesn't know that is just ignorant.

[farmout rightarm]

55. You're claiming they are willing to kill their customers. I find that an astonishing

and just plain goofy claim. I guess we'll just disagree on this one.

By the way, most 'product liability' litigation is nothing more than idiots misusing something and being encouraged to sue by ambulance chasing shysters. Read the "warning" labels on most devices these days and tell me they're not CYAs brought on by assholes taking advantage of the legal ...er, system.
:grr:

[TexasObserver]

58. Not just claiming it. That's a fact. Toyota. Firestone. Ford.

None of these ring a bell?

Products liability litigation is how we progressives make the horrible goons of the GOP and big business take into consideration safety for consumer goods. If we didn't, you'd have electrocuted yourself or had your car kill you years ago.

[farmout rightarm]

60. Whatever you say. I agree with anything you have ever said or thought

or will in the future. Your perseverance has converted me; I will never again buy or use anything made by a corporation.

[Wilms]

67. *cough*

" The following figures are drawn from the 1968 memorandum written by and circulated amongst senior management
at the Ford Motor Company concerning cost-benefit analysis of retrofitting the Pinto before sending the car into the marketplace. "

http://www.calbaptist.edu/dskubik/pinto.htm

[jtuck004]

74. Philip Morris and Marlboros? How do we use them safely?

[farmout rightarm]

80. What does "safely" mean? With zero risk? You can't do anything that "safely"

Life is a sexually-transmitted terminal disease. What the hell do you want, a free-from-danger pass for eternity?

I smoked cigarettes for 44 years...quit in 2007 because the damn things got absurdly expensive. My doctor
says I'm lucky, my health is far better than average for my age (67)...like the other guy said, "shit happens"
and it's true.

I just don't understand why some people don't think I'm a 'good' Democrat because I think people should take some responsibility for their own condition.

[KittyWampus]

56. You are hilarious. Oh, and since you are supposedly an aeronautics engineer-

how about that Columbia space shuttle.
"
NASA's Shuttle safety regulations stated that external tank foam shedding and subsequent debris strikes upon the Shuttle itself were safety issues that needed to be resolved before a launch was cleared, but launches were often given the go-ahead as engineers studied the foam shedding problem without a successful resolution. The majority of Shuttle launches recorded such foam strikes and thermal tile scarring in violation of safety regulations.<2> During re-entry of STS-107, the damaged area allowed the hot gases to penetrate and destroy the internal wing structure,<3> rapidly causing the in-flight breakup of the vehicle. A massive ground search in parts of Texas, Louisiana and Arkansas recovered crew remains and many vehicle fragments."

[farmout rightarm]

59. You just pasted in a disconnected and unreadable bunch of unattributed nonsense.

And you think *I* am "hilarious"???

I've debated creationists with more moxie.

[TexasObserver]

64. self delete

[rasputin1952]

72. Wow...how about tobacco companies, phamraceuticals...

and a host of other entities that have come up w/"killer" products; (and obfuscate the facts involved).

[farmout rightarm]

78. I love how "wow" so subtly substitutes for "you're a dumbfuck"

Nice. :-)

But here's the thing: tobacco "companies" just evolved as the demand manifested itself. I can't prove it, but I would give huge odds they never started out with a corporate plan that said "let's sell poison to people and hope it kills them." Even if they were evil from the start, I seriously doubt they were THAT stupid.

But most of our Founders were in or got into the tobacco business (and some even into Cannabis...which gets way more of a 'pass' here on DU - not that I disagree with that)

And it's a drug, not really different except for the current stigma from other drugs...all of which are either refined, manufactured or synthesized for profit. Maybe the profit motive is less than honorable but that's a philosophical discussion for an economics/government forum...the fact is we adopted the system and good or bad, it's what we have.

It seems a little disingenuous to see DUers vilifying virtually all corporations when surely some of them have jobs because of them. It's almost heretical to even SEEM to defend a corp, the embodiment of evil. But nobody has (as far as I've seen) has proposed a better alternative. I don't know how a Mom and Pop outfit can make a car or a television that anyone would buy...do you?

So that gets us to the inevitable case where a product (or a design...the luge thing) is accused of causing injury or death. But what really -caused- them? If I break my back in a car wreck, admitting it was my fault, if it was, doesn't get me a sack of money. Much easier to sue any and every entity (company and/or person) who ever put their paws on the thing. I really hope we Democrats are not so disconnected from basic honesty that we refuse to accept the principle of self-determination and responsibility...that way lies
sloth and ruin.

Defending their products against both genuine and bogus liability claims is an absolute necessity in today's litigious society. It's literally a fight for survival. I understand there are some people who think all corporations should be dissolved or outlawed....there are some who deny global climate change and insist humans were created 6000 years ago too.

[rasputin1952]

87. First things first...

I have never alluded that anyone on DU is a "dumbfuck".

As for the rest of your post, I have to ask, have you ever worked on say, car engines, even as a shadetree mechanic, almost everyone realizes that there are certain things that can cause injury, as well as better ways to do things that won't harm people. This is not to say some people are a tad "slow" in some aspects, they still get their fingers caught in fan blades and in belts and a whole lot of other things. Do I think people should win a law suit because they tried to clean out a chute while the lawnmower was running and lost 3-4 fingers, no I don't. There is inherent risk in many products, and a little common sense goes a long way.

Then there are products, like pharmaceuticals, that we rely not only on a company, but the FDA to protect us from unexpected "mishaps", far and above what can be considered "normal" under certain circumstances, We trust in entities to produce a safe and effective product, when they fail in that aspect, and eople are inujured or die because a company decided to cover up evidence of the defect in order to gain profit, they deserve to be sued, that is one recourse citizens have to keep companies with defective merchandise in check.

No amount of money will replace a life of a badly mangled limb. No amount of money can possibly cover what happened to those who faithfully took a medication and had horrible consequences. But money is what a company understands, it is not about humanity, it is about cashflow. If you are walking behind a lawn mower, and the blade becomes disengaged because of a design flaw, and you wind up with badly mangled ankles, and may never walk again, don't you think you have a right to seek recompense. It wasn't your fault the blade became disengaged, it was a poor design that was not properly tested...you became the reason there was a recall, and you have been mangled. But you are just going to sit down and accept that? Who will pay for your medical bills, if you can't work, who will support you? All you wanted to do was have a tidy lawn, but you became a cripple because of a flaw that was avoidable.

Yu don't think an individual has a legal right to seek damages?

I don't get that.

[farmout rightarm]

91. I really don't disagree with much you said right there...

although I still maintain that the use of "wow" as an initial word sure does appear to be or strongly indicate a subtle if acceptable way to say "how could anyone believe that crap". Maybe a degree or two below 'dumbfuck' so I'll accept your take on that.

Look, I'm a design engineer...have been since I got out of college in 1965. I know a LOT of men and women too who do the same thing. I can tell you with total honesty that no engineer I ever met would come close to entertaining the idea of creating a product that would pose a threat to the safety of any person who did not expect SOME possibility of harm...and I'll tell you right now there aren't many people like that.

I suppose you know that some 40,000 Americans die in car wrecks every year, yes? Maybe you never ride in cars but if you do, that fact which is no secret should make you quit if you want absolute safety.

I never said a person shouldn't have the right to be compensated for harm brought on by misdeeds such as gross negligence, which outside the courtroom is very rare, I just think it's a not very complimentary fact
on contemporary society that nowadays people have such an easy way to collect damages caused by their
own actions. I think Olympic athletes by and large grasp the principle.

Your example of the lawn mower blade is interesting...I have a friend who actually had an injury similar to the one you described. It turned out he had replaced the blade but neglected to install the lock washer as the instructions say to do. This fact only came out after he had sued 1) the manufacturer, 2) the subcontracted design firm, 3) the retail seller and 4) the maker of the pliers (!) he used instead of the
recommended wrench in the instructions. All of which is typical when money is on the line...sue everyone who ever had anything to do with the product.

But I have no problem with a tort against any entity that deliberately lies or does a cover-up, I just admit that's not always the case.

[rasputin1952]

101. In the case of your friend...

let me state that I am sorry that he was injured. In his case however, if I were to have sat on that jury, he would have lost his case.The fault was, (from what I gather), his alone. While I am far from a fan of corporations, I am a fan of Justice.

On another note, you, being an engineer, , and I do not mean this sarcastically, but do you guys ever confer w/the users of a product? Some are designed to the point of absurdity, and with what appears to be a complete lack of customer ease. I have a Ford Taurus that is a nightmare to work on, even for the simplest of jobs that any shadetree mechanic should be able to handle with relative ease. I guess I'm saying, what looks good on paper is often a nightmare in reality. Just changing a simple thing like an oil filter can bring on a stroke.

I have long been a n advocate of engineers/designers, having to use the equipment before it goes to market...that would change things dramatically...:hi:

[farmout rightarm]

104. You make a most excellent point, with which I agree wholeheartedly. You may have heard

the not altogether apocryphal engineer's "motto"........."I just design the damn thing, I don't have to work on it"

There's a lot more truth in that than we'd like to admit. I'm not much impressed with either the ingenuity or the ethics of many younger engineers in America. Many of them can read back a handful of equations but have absolutely no 'seat of the pants' understanding of how they relate to the real world. Your oil filter comment sure does ring a bell with me...I overhauled the engine of my 1962 Mercedes 190SL 40 years ago in my mom's driveway...nowadays anything beyond filling up the windshield washer tank almost requires a diploma from some factory (and the guys who have those scare me more often than not)

For what it's worth, during all the years I was actively doing design work, I did consult with end users and worked with them to figure out how to make our gadgets not only useful, but usable. That philosophy did lead to some conflicts with top management but one makes the case and does his or her best (maybe one of these days I'll expand on that particular period as it relates very directly to contemporary politics) :-)

[farmout rightarm]

4. The designers are not human?

God damn those Andromedan luge track designing bastards!

[LiberalFighter]

9. I think they were trying to blame the sledder.

[farmout rightarm]

29. Well, if you had said that in the OP, it would have saved a lot of electrons.

:shrug:

[Lint Head]

5. it looked to me like something broke or came off of the sled.

[TexasObserver]

6. They're worried about liability after touting the track's speed so much.

They immediately huddled, studied the tape, and said "he didn't make a correction" or words to that effect. While that is probably true, it doesn't mean his inability to correct caused the death. His death was caused by dangerous beams exposed in a critical curve, with no protection to the athlete.

[LiberalFighter]

8. Exactly. And they could had avoided that by various methods.

[TexasObserver]

15. Any point with exposed beams should have been padded.

Particularly on curves where high speeds were expected and loss of control was a possibility.

[LiberalFighter]

18. At a minimum. It would had help immensely if they had moved the beams further back.

As well as spaced them further apart to reduce the number of possible hits.

[farmout rightarm]

43. Where the hell were you guys when they built the Titanic and the Concorde?

:silly:

Talk about Monday morning quarterbacking...

[LiberalFighter]

109. Common sense would not put structures near high activity.

And when there are structures too close speed restrictions are lowered to make it safer as with enclosed bridges part of a highway.

And the difference between someone driving a car at 90mph and crashing vs a luge driver at 90mph is that the luge driver is totally unprotected.

[hayu_lol]

11. Why don't we all just call this an accident?

Something went wrong and a person died. Happens all the time in real life, much less in cutting-edge athletic competitions. Cutting edge stuff frequently goes bad.

Just an accident.

[TexasObserver]

14. Why don't we call this a preventable death?

It's not "just an accident." A man died, and it was easily preventable. Someone didn't do their job. They worried about making the track fast. They worried about making it ready in time. They didn't worry about making it safe.

If you wish to cover your eyes, that's your choice.

[farmout rightarm]

32. Every accident is preventable with 20-20 foresight or a Magic Eight Ball.

Or a time machine.

[KittyWampus]

34. This accident was preventable if proper accommodations had been made during the design process

[farmout rightarm]

40. Sorry, "accomodations" has no meaning for me as a part of design criteria.

I've designed hundreds of products and never did it thinking "well, this thing will probably kill someone but I won't worry about that"...do you suppose there are engineers who take that position? I never met one.

[KittyWampus]

49. you apparently live in a bubble. You want a prime example? Look up SUV's and roll-overs.

[TexasObserver]

36. This accident was preventable by design and construction.

And in case you're completely unaware of how we do things in America, this is how we find design problems and fix them. If there's no downside to bad design, there's no profit motive to pay more attention to design issues.

Your safety everywhere you go depends on an interwoven set of controls that include holding responsible those who build cars, or buildings, or airplanes, or luge tracks in a dangerous condition.

[farmout rightarm]

39. Really? I've been an aeronautical engineer for nearly 40 years.

I think I have a vague idea how it works. I really don't see how your comment refutes mine in any substantive way. Unless you think 'zero defects' is actually feasible in the real world.

[TexasObserver]

46. Vague idea is right.

If you've never been sued for malpractice as an engineer, congratulations.

I'll bet the airline manufacturer for whom you've engineered has been sued successfully for engineering design flaws, however. If you are unaware that design flaws are often discovered and identified through litigation, now is a good time to learn.

This will be found to be a design flaw, if it gets that far, which it probably won't, because the players involved know they have liability, and they'll pay the family of the deceased a handsome settlement.

[farmout rightarm]

70. Any asshole can sue anyone in the country for any reason or excuse.

And I managed to avoid any liability suits even though I never had a magic crystal ball like yours that lets you predict the outcome of this event.

[TexasObserver]

81. Getting past a motion to dismiss isn't so easy.

Stick to whatever you know.

[northzax]

94. I bet they won't

There is no history of liability litigation at this level. The user was by any definition an expert (it was the Olympics after all) and was familiar with the track and therefore assumed the inherent risk. A luge track is so specialized as to be litigation proof from professionals. The pressure to enact changes in this and other tracks will come from the users, if the top 50 people in the world won't slide on your track, it is useless.

That said, having exposed beams in close proximity to a track is just plain stupid. It is by no means unheard of for sliders to leave the track in an accident, a few years ago a bobsledder did to much the same tragic result (as I recall, that was a concrete abutment) inside the track, sliding sports are relatively safe, sliding on ice is painful, but with good helmets not all that dangerous, it's not the going that's the problem, it's how you stop. All efforts should be made to keep unsledded riders inside the track area, whether that's with higher walls or sone sort of netting. Netting, of course, has it's own problems, you can seriously damage yourself hitting netting on an angle, but a few torn ligaments beats death or paralysis.

That said. This particular accident itself was certainly the fault of the slider (if any real fault is to be found) he crashed. Bad luck. And decent track design should have kept it as just that, an accident that his friends and co competitors would be ribbing him about. Crashes are a fact of life when you are pushing yourself and your equipment to the limits. Surely it's not the first time he had crashed, and it shouldn't have been the last. In my younger days as a seriously competitive skiier, I crashed all the time, it told me I was either going too fast or beyond my abilities orthat I made a mistake. Bunch of bruises, a couple fractures and sprains, thankfully no major tendons or ligaments for me, but I certainly saw much worse. It's the responsibility of the course to mitigate outside hazards, like trees or steel beams.

[TexasObserver]

97. Then it's a bet. His family has a lay down case worth millions.

You may not see the liability exposure, but all the entities and individuals who participated in the decision to leave the beams exposed, in spite of the obvious danger, are exposed. Their insurers will probably have to pay part of a settlement that will be over a million dollars, Canadian or US.

There are already lawyers trying to sign this case up, and someone will get it done. Why? Because it's the only way the family will ever find out what happened and why. It's the only justice they'll get, and they'll take it.

This is a liability case and its settlement value is in excess of one million dollars.

[northzax]

103. Then say goodbye to the olympics

In any developed nation. Humans were simply not designed to travel at those speeds.

So what will actually happen is that the governing body will issue new track regulations to minimize this happening in the future and everyone will move on. It's almost impossible for a de facto professional athlete to sue for damages incurred while in the sport of his choice. No one involved wants to open that door. The family will get some money from the IOC, probably, and from the Georgian Olympic Committee, because it's bad pr otherwise. But Real liability? Assumed by a professional? Unlikely.

[TexasObserver]

105. Nonsense. That's why they carry insurance.

There are so many potential defendants in this matter. Some will undoubtedly be appropriate to sue in the USA, which means the case is probably driven by a tough US firm that takes high dollar cases against well heeled corporate defendants. If the man's family wants to sue for this in the USA or Canada, they will have no problem getting a top notch plaintiffs firm, and they'll win. The cost will be part of the cost of doing business for the Olympics. It will become a tiny portion of the billions that change hands over the Olympics.

As for the governing board and their action, they've already mandated that the NEXT Olympic luge track be at least 10% slower, and they took that action before this tragic and unnecessary death.

[farmout rightarm]

99. Here's another thing I don't understand. Unless the track was off-limits to the entrants

they had an opportunity to ...just...look at it, right? Are we supposed to believe the people who were going down this thing had no clue it was too dangerous to negotiate without dying but did it anyway? What kind of sense does that make?

You make an excellent point: if the thing has a too high danger-to-utility ratio nobody will use it and then nobody will view it. And having made that claim, I really wonder how many tickets could be sold to see
someone stuffed into a wood chipper. I'm willing to bet quite a few.

[northzax]

106. They're olympians

They don't expect to crash. The course is obviously not too dangerous to negotiate, thousands of attempts have been made. In this particular case it was too dangerous to crash on. At that particular point. But no athlete thinks about failure (and that's what this was) if you go in thinking about what happens if you crash, you've already lost. Often the public push for safety 'enhancements' comes from outside the athletes themselves, even if they will privately agree. Citius altius fortius and all that.

[KittyWampus]

33. Because the luge was engineered. It was designed. Intentionally. By professionals

whose job it is to anticipate things.

[farmout rightarm]

42. Ah...now I see. You demand perfection. Do you actually expect it?

What a world that would be...
:eyes:

[TexasObserver]

53. The death was preventable by better design that didn't require significant additional work.

If they had put plywood up on that one spot, it would have kept the athlete on the track and prevented him from slamming into the beam. It was preventable by adding just a little to the construction.

If you don't understand why it's important to hold people responsible for design errors, go spend a few yours educating yourself so you can at least know how progressives feel on this topic.

[DrDan]

21. I don't think protection on those beams would have saved him at 90 mph

I am sure there will be lots of folks studying the liability of this. Seems to me that if he died while on the track - there was some sort of a design error.

[TexasObserver]

26. In my view, there is liability for either design or construction.

This thing didn't appear magically over night. It was created by a lot of very smart people who were paid to design it fast and exciting. It is impossible that they did so without investigating the possibility of humans flying off the track at key points. Any point at which a flying human could hit an exposed beam is a place they had to know about. They would have tested it with models. They would have had experts weigh in.

There are insurance policies in place for the contractor, for the subs, for the design team.

We expect accidents, but we don't expect them to be deadly. We expect there to be a padding at a point where the athlete can crash into it, or perhaps a netting of some kind to prevent hitting the beams.

In my view, it's clearly a design flaw.

[DrDan]

37. that seems quite obvious to me - the guy left the track and hit a beam

no way that should happen - whether padded or not

[TexasObserver]

62. If they simply put up a wall of plywood to create a long, flat surface.

It seems the athlete would have likely bounced off such a wall and onto the track. It could have even been plexiglass. They simply didn't put enough protection at that curve. Every time I see it, I wonder how they could decide not to put a shield up there.

[DrDan]

107. I agree - seems like such a simple solution - particularly in areas that

could be prone to the rider losing a grip on the track - or leaving the track

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

12. Did everyone who practiced on that track die?

[TexasObserver]

16. Is that what you it think it takes to establish the track is dangerous?

Must the accelerator stick on every Toyota?

Must the gas tank ignite for every Pinto?

Must every Firestone tire explode and flip an SUV?

[LiberalFighter]

19. They reported that the participants were vocally concerned about the track.

Which they rarely do.

And another expert (I'm not sure if he was) but considered the investigation which supposedly lasted 45 minutes was a whitewash and blaming it entirely on the sledder.

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

79. dangerous conditions magnify the effects of human error

Nobody is questioning whether the track was more dangerous than usual. It is said to be the fastest luge course ever constructed. But, of course, luge tracks are supposed to be fast so that's not obviously a design flaw.

The concern is that on such a fast track errors are likelier to result in very bad outcomes.

Typical "pilot error" would kill nobody if the plane was on the ground.

When the streets are icy we are concerned because people who drive too fast or too aggressively will get in some accidents that wouldn't happen on dry roads. But that doesn't mean that bad driving on ice that results in a collision is an act of god.

To say it was human error is not to say the track wasn't also unusually fast or lacked high fencing. So the complaint about track design would be that it did not adequately compensate for the possibility of human error.

[farmout rightarm]

82. Well, "did not adequately compensate for the possibility of human error"

is a euphemism for "foolproof". Don't we all agree that nothing is?

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

86. It depends on the objective

When I said "adequately" I was offering a better way of framing the OP's general thesis but to say "what is adequate?" begs the question, "adequate to do what?"

If the objective of a luge track is to make it impossible for human error to result in death then the design is at fault. It should have a top speed of about three miles per hour.

If the objective is to make a fast, exciting track for world-class lugers to compete on with some assumption of risk then the design is not obviously faulty. It becomes a sliding-scale question balancing risk against the legitimate sport-related objectives of track design.

I think it was obviously human error. That doesn't answer the question of whether the track should have been designed differently one way or another.

How high priority is guaranteeing no deaths? That's a question about the sport itself.

NASCAR is calibrated to occasional death. An amusement park ride seeks zero death.

[farmout rightarm]

89. You have distilled the truth in a concise way: amusement park rides have safety

(or are supposed to) as absolutely paramount consideration (comports with my earlier claim that no intelligent corporate entity wants to kill its customers) while -racing- venues recognize that their very attraction is contingent on the possibility of tragedy. The participants know this and agree to it and is of course one of the reasons they are amply compensated. The same principle is at work, albeit to a more benign degree, in virtually every competitive spectator endeavor.

Are we really that distant from the gladiator days (if they really existed...it doesn't actually matter)...the truth is, humans will pay big bucks to watch their avatars risk their lives, as they sit in soft chairs eating Cheetos.
;-)

[TexasObserver]

83. I agree with your conclusion.

To say it was human error is not to say the track wasn't also unusually fast or lacked high fencing. So the complaint about track design would be that it did not adequately compensate for the possibility of human error.

[LiberalFighter]

108. Did you see the track and the beams?

Did you see how close together they had the beams to each other and right at the track?

[farmout rightarm]

48. I shall now call you Doctor Royce Worthington

"man who asks inconvenient questions" from Heinlein's _Magic, Incorporated_

:D

[LLStarks]

13. Nodar lifted his head. His error. nt

[TexasObserver]

17. He didn't create the defectively designed track.

A track unreasonably dangerous in its defective state.

[LiberalFighter]

20. Gee... yet they made the starting point of the track the same as the womens.

[jesus_of_suburbia]

23. I just feel horrible about the entire thing. Let's not lay blame, let's just fix it so it doesn't

happen again.

[SoCalDem]

24. Why not just put a big ole safey-netting thing over the top?

That would keep people from flying off and out of the track.. They do wear helmets, so there would be some protection ...and even a few broken bones would not be impossible to recover from..

[jesus_of_suburbia]

27. Sounds like a great idea to me.

I bet that people would complain that they couldn't see it as well though.

Tough luck, let them complain... reasonable safety should come first.

[SoCalDem]

30. They go so fast you can't really see them anyway:)

and if a net keeps another 21 yr old kid alive, it's worth it..

[Earth_First]

41. According to the IOC and the Luge Federation

it was human error through inexperience that led to the tragic accident.

[TexasObserver]

66. Fortunately, they're not the people who decide such things.

They have a vested interest in blaming the athlete.

Their denials are no more important than those Toyota made.

The track was defectively designed, and it killed a man in an easily preventable accident.

[MadHound]

47. Actually looking at that video I think it was human error

The guy came out of the curve too high, overcorrected and lost control.

[farmout rightarm]

51. Impossible. A thing like that can only result from criminal corporate negligence.

:shrug:

[MadHound]

52. About the only thing I can fault the builders of this course on

Is not constructing higher walls to keep people from going over the top. That was stupid. But I don't thing that the nature of the course is, per se, dangerous in and of itself. It is simply the next evolution in these courses, faster, tighter, designed to get the most speed.

[farmout rightarm]

61. They should have called me, I could have made it safe at minimum cost!

I would have told them to spread sand all over that damn slippery ice...that would slow them down to a safe velocity.

[Blue-Jay]

63. Shit happens.

I know that sounds trite and uncaring, but shit does indeed happen. The guy was a participant in a dangerous sport, and was involved in a terrible accident. I suppose it makes some people feel better to point fingers, but was still just a horrible accident.

[farmout rightarm]

65. I said that list night and was beaten severely about the head and shoulders.

Apparently some people believe everything that happens is someone's fault.
:shrug:

[KittyWampus]

71. when there are design flaws and absent safety measures it damned well is someone's fault.

[Blue-Jay]

73. Who is at fault?

Name a name. WHO is to blame?

It's a dangerous fucking sport, and frankly I'm more upset at the various news outlets who keep replaying the guy's unfortunate death.

Shit, people die in auto accidents all the time, but I don't see anyone bitching about that.

[KittyWampus]

75. It's a dangerous sport. Can you name how many other lugers died? Since it's so dangerous?

edit- and NASCAR has changed things quite a bit in deference to safety.

[Blue-Jay]

77. So, there's no danger involved?

See? I can deflect too. (It's easy!)

It was a horrible tragic accident. Name a name, if you want to blame someone.

[TexasObserver]

85. Probably several entities and individuals.

1. The design team for the track, particularly those who participated in the decision not to construct a safety barrier for the beams on that curve.

2. The persons who oversaw the design team.


The failure to plan for a high risk accident is a design failure. This case is a liability case.

[depakid]

88. Maybe more than that, given the prior warnings- particularly the very public one by the Aussie

the day before (she'd had a bit of a gnarly run).

This was eminently foreseeable, mate- and posed an unreasonable risk of harm at this level of the sport (at least under the conditions) that may not be waivable. I'm sure there are a lot of people spending late nights looking at all of those issues right about now.

The Whistler track is a fast and technically difficult course and had attracted criticism before the Games, with some sliders labelling it dangerous and even life threatening.

Australia's luge competitor, Campbell-Pegg, had been one of those criticising the track. ''I think they are pushing it a little too much,'' she said on Thursday, after struggling to keep control of her sled during practice. ''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.''

Australia also has seven athletes competing in the bobsled and two in the skeleton, both of which use the same track.

More than 12 sliders have crashed during practice for the Games, which feature a broader international field than the World Cup circuit. Some competitors had questioned the wisdom of creating such a track for Olympic competition, suggesting it would be too difficult for inexperienced competitors from some nations.

Kumaritashvili had already crashed during one of his previous practice runs but the incidents have not been limited to less-credentialled competitors. Defending Olympic champion Armin Zoeggeler of Italy also crashed out in practice on Friday.

Women's world champion Erin Hamlin had been another to warn of dangerous speeds last week, saying: ''If you get into trouble you have to instantly get yourself out of it, and at speeds like that it's really hard.'' The US bobsled team reportedly dubbed one of the track's corners ''50/50'' during practice last year because it crashed every second time it attempted to navigate it.

More: http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/sport/aussie-lugers-in-nervous-lockdown-20100214-nypm.html

[TexasObserver]

90. Had not read that. She really nails them on it.

I'd heard that some sledders had complained about it being too fast, but had not seen that report.

This thing didn't build itself. Someone planned every aspect of it, and they're all in the soup if they had a role in the decision not to erect barriers where such would have been wise. Such barriers could have been Plexiglas.

[depakid]

98. Having had a look at parts of the track (admittedly from a lay perspective)

it's not hard to see the problem and envision safer and relatively simple mitigation(s).

Speaking of mitigation- in another context, this sort of PR won't be helpful:

Shameless luge officials blame the victim

WHISTLER, B.C. – The Federation Internationale de Luge (FIL) is acting like someone in a fender-bender. You know, admit nothing, shrug, and blame the other guy.

Apparently without a trace of shame, the world luge governing body, as well as the Vancouver Olympic Organizing Committee (VANOC), met the press Saturday morning to blame Nodar Kumaritashvili solely for his own death and to accept zero responsibility themselves for Friday’s fatal crash that killed the 21-year-old Georgian at the Whistler Sliding Centre.

Yes, it’s a fast track, but it’s not too fast and it’s not unsafe, luge officials stressed several times at a morning press conference, where they also said all scenarios, including cancelling the entire sliding competition at these Olympic Games, were discussed before they decided to go ahead as scheduled.

They’re trying to revise history as they go here, adamant that the WSC track is completely safe and that Kumaritashvili’s own driving error led to his death, despite a litany of complaints and cautions from the athletes themselves in the weeks and days leading to the Olympics. And even though Kumaritashvili’s death is the first luge fatality in 35 years, “there was nothing out of the ordinary that signalled there needed to be a change made,’’ according to FIL secretary-general Svein Romstad.

Yet they have shortened the men’s race, scheduled to begin later Saturday, to the women’s starting point and they will shorten the women’s start, perhaps down to the junior start point, in a bid to slow down the runaway speeds, which have clearly exceeded what the sliding organization thought would be achieved on the track. They also will raise the walls where the fatal crash occurred in a bid to – hold on for this one – “deal with the emotional component for athletes.’’

They are making all these changes even though the track is completely safe, or as VANOC vice-president for sport Tim Gayda put it, “we did everything in our power to make that a safe track.’’

Except for all the new stuff, apparently.

It sounds as if lawyers drummed into them that they should admit no responsibility whatsoever. German Josef Fendt, FIL president, when asked if legal action had been threatened, answered, “I don’t know.’’

More: http://thestar.blogs.com/daveperkins/2010/02/shameless-luge-officials-blame-the-victim.html

As we know, subsequent remedial measures don't generally bear (legally) on the question of liability- and handling them is tricky (to say the least) so perhaps this is inevitable, but damn!

[TexasObserver]

100. All such boards circle the wagons, close ranks, and move in lock step.

Faced with a horrific death and almost certainly product liability and gross negligence claims, everyone exposed on this is acting as if the guy just was solely responsible. His failure to negotiate the curve well is not negligence. It's a part of the sport, just as running out of bounds accidentally. But their failure to make that dangerous curve safe in the event of a crash is inexcusable.

[Junkdrawer]

102. I said this Friday: "That whooshing sound you hear isn't from the luge track... "

"It's from the rush of wrongful death lawyers scrambling for planes to Georgia..."

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=7701654&mesg_id=7701711

This one is not even close. I'd guess a HUGE settlement will be offered. Question is, will the family take it? Blaming the accident on their son in such a public manner is probably not going down well. I know I'd fight like hell to clear my son's name.

[Name removed]

76. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[JVS]

93. negligence happens too.

[Joe the Revelator]

84. Good thing we have you on the case

[Junkdrawer]

92. SB Nation has been all over this story from the start...

....

These are all sensible changes. But, for me, the most frustrating thing has been the way Olympic officials have shunted any blame for Friday's tragedy off of themselves. Beyond their probe that found "no deficiencies" in the track, they described their decision to move the men's starting position as due to the "emotional component" of the lugers' psyches, rather than as a simple safety precaution.

It's just so disingenuous. Yes, luge is a risky sport. If you throw yourself at speeds of 70-90 MPH on a glorified sled down a windy track, you know that bad things can happen. But just because luge is a risky sport, that doesn't absolve officials of any responsibility to make sure that the conditions are safe. And Whistler's clearly weren't: the athletes knew it, as did the officials.

Indeed, if Whistler wasn't an unsafe risk, why did Olympic officials tell track designers in Sochi not to make a course as fast as the one in Vancouver? Consider this tidbit from a piece on CTVOlympics.ca from last week:

Early in the planning for the 2014 Sochi Games, the Russian hosts were told flatly by the sport's governing bodies: those speeds at the Whistler Sliding Centre? Don't even dream of trying to match them.

So these types of speeds were safe for Vancouver but not for Sochi? Of course not. Organizers knew they were pushing the limit with Whistler and didn't want to replicate that mistake four years from now. They just didn't have the will to fix the problems at Whistler before tragedy struck. And in doing nothing, they acted recklessly.


http://www.sbnation.com/2010/2/12/1307975/luge-crash-winter-olympics-nodar-kumaritashvili-georgia

BTW: That article in CTVOlympics.ca published a week BEFORE the accident is a must-read...

http://www.ctvolympics.ca/news-centre/newsid=39462.html

[TexasObserver]

95. co-sign

[Kalun D]

96. Several mistakes were made

First it's too long a drop, too much speed, which is why they moved the start. I believe it's got more drop than any track ever.

Second they didn't pad obstacles like the poll the guy hit. I've run my sportbike at a racetrack and they had air pads on all the bad corners, no way you could get hurt. If they were going to make it faster, there should have been more padding, or a padded fence to keep people from going off.

Third they didn't let anybody but Canadians practice on the course until near the start of the games. If a lot of people had been on it there would have been a consensus it was too dangerous.