Canadian freeskier Sarah Burke dead at 29 following superpipe skiing accident
The Canadian freestyle skiing superstar Sarah Burke died Thursday, January 19, after succumbing to the injuries that she had sustained from a fall during a training run 10 days ago in Utah.
The 29-year-old Burke reportedly pulled off a stunt and landed on the bottom end of the superpipe, where she fell over and ended up hitting her head during a training session for an event at the Park City Mountain resort on Tuesday, January 10.
She was air-lifted to the University Hospital in Salt Lake City, where she was admitted in Intensive Care (ICU) unit. The injuries had sent Burke into a coma, making the severity of the injuries apparent.
According to a statement by Burke’s publicist Nicole Wood, her medical reports revealed damage to her brain due to the deficiency of oxygen and blood following a cardiac arrest.
Doctors performed surgery to repair a ruptured perennial artery. However, their efforts to help the action sports athlete were in vain as the imaging results showed that she was not going to make it.
In a statement, Burke’s family said, “Sarah passed away peacefully, surrounded by those she loved.”
The family further stated that Burke’s organs and tissues were donated in accordance with her request before the accident.
A six-time Winter X Games Gold Medallist, the Ontario-based freeskier was arguably one of the most dominant female athletes in action sports, a prominence that had earned her an ESPY (Excellence in Sports Performance Yearly) Award in 2007. She was nominated for the same prestigious award last year as well due to her pipe prowess, a department where her skills were matched by none.
Burke played a vital role in getting freestyle skiing successfully included in Winter Olympics, winning the Olympic officials through her arguments to ensure that the discipline makes its debut at the Sochi Games in 2014.
The news of her death has spread across the entire action sports community, creating an atmosphere of grief just days before the latest edition of Winter X Games is due to start in Aspen, Colorado.
American superpipe skiing sensation Simon Dumont, a multiple Winter X Games medallist, kept his comment on the death of Burke short, saying, “She's probably one of the nicest people I've known in my life, and that's about the only thing I have to say about it.”
The death of Burke is indeed a huge loss for the action sports community that has left millions around the world in grief.
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