Officials are attempting to determine how a track worker at the Sanki Sliding Center - host to the bobsled, skeleton and luge events in the Sochi Olympics - got in the path of a bobsled that hit him and left him with leg injuries and a concussion.
A forerunner sled was sent down the track to test conditions before two-man training but crashed into the worker, who was airlifted to a local hospital. Some officials reported that one of his legs was broken, while others said both legs were broken.
Video revealed three men working near the finish line before two of them went over the wall to escape the oncoming sled. The third man was using a motorized air blower and it’s possible he may not have been able to hear warning announcements about the sled on the track.
IOC president Thomas Bach said to the Associated Press that his group didn’t know why the worker was in that zone at the time.
“According to standard procedure, a warning signal was given ahead of the forerunners’ bob beginning its run on the track,” Sochi organizers said in a statement following the incident according to the AP. “The reasons for the icemaker’s presence on the track after the warning signal are currently being determined.”
Training was delayed by roughly half an hour today due to the incident, but that and the luge team relay did go on.
