Ski mass start among girls, held on March 8 in Sochi as part of the Winter Sports Games for students, resulted in a scandal and the hospitalization of nine athletes.
What happened during the race? In conditions of poor visibility, a massive collapse occurred on the high-speed section of the route. Many athletes were injured, some were taken to the hospital with serious injuries.
In the video published on the Radioskis Telegram channel, it is heard that the consequences of the collapse were serious. Some athletes screamed in pain and were unable to get up and complete the distance on their own.
Consequences of the collapse Commentator Dmitry Guberniev spoke in more detail about the injuries of the skiers in his Telegram channel. According to him, three athletes received traumatic brain injuries, two received open fractures of their legs. The skiers also suffered from broken fingers and hands.
According to the competition schedule, after the women's mass start, a similar race was supposed to take place among the boys. After the incident, the Ministry of Sports decided to cancel the start. The department also noted that they would analyze the circumstances of the incident. The prosecutor's office of the Adler district of Sochi began an investigation.
«At the start I felt that something would go wrong» One of the skiers injured during the collapse, Maria Rusalovskaya, representing the Murmansk region, noted that the race was held in conditions hazardous to the health of the athletes conditions.
«»I simply have no words. The track is all broken. We fell one after another. Someone was lucky, someone managed to slip through. In the morning there was heavy fog. When I was driving along the track, I didn’t see anyone. At the start, I already felt that something will go wrong. I hope they will be punished for this,» she said.
The representative of the Yaroslavl region team, Marya Shemyakina, believes that the organizers should have canceled the women's mass start, since visibility was «almost zero» from -for the fog.
«»I was preparing for this start, of course, the weather disappointed me, but I wanted to run the race. The collapse happened on the descent. Before the descent everything was fine, but when I began to descend, nothing was visible at all. As a result, I’m going downhill , the fog clears in front of me — and I see a huge blockage of athletes. The speed was quite high, and before this blockage I had about five meters left, there was simply no other choice but to fall, since the athletes were lying all over the track and even their «I couldn't get around. I ran into a girl, and two more athletes ran into me from behind,» said the skier.
The head of the Russian Ski Racing Federation, Elena Vyalbe, expressed the opinion that since the competition took place, it means the conditions for holding it were acceptable .
“»I am not a member of the jury, the question is not for me. I am sure that if there is any danger, then the competition will be postponed, there was no danger in the first place,” she said.
Another athlete injured in the race is Daria Ermakova published a short commentary about the weather conditions in the village of Estosadok, where the launch took place.
«»Dudes. Did I mention the weather? Here’s the weather for you,” she wrote, accompanying the publication with photographs of her face broken in the rubble.